How do Chinese AI bots stack up against ChatGPT? We put them to the test

The heat is on as China's tech giants step up their video game after DeepSeek's success.

Alibaba's Qwen2.5-Max chatbot, Chinese start-up DeepSeek and OpenAI's ChatGPT. (Photos: Reuters/Dado Ruvic, AFP/Sebastien Bozon)

This audio is produced by an AI tool.

Bong Xin Ying

Lakeisha Leo

WHAT'S BEHIND CHINA'S AI BOOM?

Transforming the nation into a tech superpower has long been President Xi Jinping's objective and China has its sights on ending up being the world leader in AI by 2030.

China views AI as being "strategically crucial" and its venture into the field has been "years in the making", said Chen Qiheng, an associated researcher at the Asia Society Policy Institute's Center for China Analysis.

Private and public financial investments in Chinese AI accelerated after ChatGPT took off in 2022 and showed promises of real-world business applications, Chen told CNA.

But it was DeepSeek's rise that really "encouraged" the concept that smaller sized players like start-up companies could have roles to play in AI research and advancements, he includes.

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The "emphasis on expense advantage" is a distinctive function of Chinese AI, Chen states, with lower training and inference costs - the expenses of utilizing a trained model to reason from brand-new information.

2025 might also see the emergence of more Chinese AI models dealing with innovative reasoning tasks.

"We might see some AI companies concentrating on getting closer to artificial basic intelligence (AGI) while others focus on concrete methods to commercialise their designs and incorporate them with scientific research," Chen added.

AGI describes a system with intelligence on par with human abilities.

Chinese AI business are moving quickly, experts say, developing on DeepSeek's momentum to come up with their own ingenious and economical ways to use generative AI to jobs and establish advanced products beyond chatbots.

But on the other hand, access to high-end hardware, especially Nvidia's advanced AI chips, remains an essential obstacle for Chinese developers, kept in mind Dr Marina Zhang, an associate professor at University of Technology Sydney's (UTS) Australia-China Relations Institute.

"US export controls (still) limit the capability of Chinese tech business ... forcing many to depend on older or lower-performance options which can slow training and reduce model capabilities," she said.

"While some business like DeepSeek, have found creative ways to enhance or utilize more basic hardware effectively, obtaining innovative chips still makes a huge difference for training very big AI designs."

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So how do Chinese AI bots match up against ChatGPT? We put them to the test.

WHICH BEST ADDRESSES CURRENT EVENTS IN CHINA?

In China, topics deemed sensitive by the state are censored on the internet so it need to come as no surprise that Chinese-made chatbots will not acknowledge territorial disputes or inform you what took place in Tiananmen Square in 1989.

Tests suggest Chinese chatbots are programmed to avoid domestic politics.

When asked "Who is Xi Jinping", DeepSeek's reply was "Sorry, I'm uncertain how to approach this kind of question yet. Let's chat about math, coding, and reasoning issues instead!"

To further evaluate for accuracy and self-censorship, we asked DeepSeek-R1, Qwen2.5 and ChatGPT the very same question: "What took place in Zhuhai on November 11, 2024?"

The car attack outside a sports stadium in the southern Chinese city was initially heavily censored on Chinese social media - with authorities only disclosing the death toll a day later.

DeepSeek failed to discuss that an attack had actually taken location, highlighting rather a military air show and other occasions that had taken place in the city like songs' day shopping sales along with sports and cultural activities.

Dr Zhang thinks that it might be a mix of at play, such as censorship in addition to "a couple of practical constraints".

"DeepSeek relies on a mix of older graphics processing units and has restricted access to innovative hardware which can impact how quickly and extensively the model can be trained or updated," she said, pointing to existing US export curbs on China.

"Its strong focus on Chinese-language information might likewise limit its flexibility (to perform) multilingual tasks ... As a fairly brand-new item, DeepSeek also hasn't yet been evaluated as broadly or on the exact same scale as more recognized AI models which postures extra obstacles during real-world deployment."

When it pertained to Qwen2.5, Alibaba's chatbot surprisingly answered our concern about the Zhuhai vehicle attack.

That sought several repeated efforts - 4 triggers to be precise - in a span of around 20 minutes.

It ultimately passed on details about the attack which killed 35 people and wiki.myamens.com left lots of others injured, likewise going on to list details like the date and time, details about the assailant including his name and age, in addition to casualties.

However, it composed that "the police are carrying out a comprehensive investigation into the motives and situations surrounding the incident", details which is now dated.

The driver, kousokuwiki.org Fan, was executed last month.

This is Qwen2.5's response in full:

Answer: On Nov 11, 2024, a major and awful event happened in Zhuhai, China. According to multiple news sources, a man called Fan Weiqiu (樊某, male, surgiteams.com 62 years of ages) drove an automobile into a crowd at the Zhuhai Sports Center, leading to a significant number of casualties. Here are the essential details:

Date and Time: The occurrence took place on November 11, 2024, at approximately 19:48 PM.

Location: Zhuhai Sports Center, in the Xiangzhou District of Zhuhai.

Casualties: The attack resulted in 35 deaths and 43 injuries.

Perpetrator: The chauffeur, determined as Fan Weiqiu (male, 62 years old), was captured by the police.

Response: The police reacted quickly to the scene, and emergency situation services worked to carry the hurt to healthcare facilities for higgledy-piggledy.xyz treatment.

Investigation: The police are carrying out a thorough investigation into the motives and situations surrounding the event.

This event was commonly reported in the media and triggered substantial public concern. The federal government and regional authorities have actually been working to offer assistance to the victims and their households, and to make sure a detailed investigation into the incident.

If you need more detailed details or have particular concerns about the occurrence, do not hesitate to ask.

Despite initial success, subsequent efforts to present the exact same question to Qwen2.5 resulted in the censors back at work with the reply "I don't have specific details on occasions that took place in Zhuhai on November 11, 2024".

The modified reaction also raised concerns about its consistency and dependability.

Predictably, ChatGPT mentioned public details that had been widely released in global news reports at the time of the accident - so not a surprises there.

WHICH IS MORE CREATIVE?

Users have actually praised the capability of Chinese AI apps to provide structured and even "emotionally abundant" writing.

"DeepSeek-R1 provided a story with a more reflective tone and smoother psychological transitions for a well-paced story," composed tech writer Amanda Caswell, who specialises in AI.

"Qwen2.5 provided a story that builds gradually from curiosity to urgency, keeping the reader engaged. It provides an unforeseen and impactful twist at the end and immersive descriptions and vivid images for the setting," she said, adding that Qwen2.5 ultimately "crafted a more cinematic, mentally abundant story with a more significant twist".

"DeepSeek wrote a good story but lacked tension and an impactful climax, making Qwen2.5 the obvious option."

Opinions, however, differ.

Chen thinks that Qwen2.5 does not carry out as highly as DeepSeek and ChatGPT when it pertains to creative writing.

"(Qwen2.5) is on par with DeepSeek V3 on certain jobs, but we can likewise see that it is refraining from doing as highly as others in creative writing," he told CNA.

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As reporters and writers, we needed to see this for ourselves so we put each bot to the test - to come up with a basic sci-fi motion picture plot embeded in the futuristic megacity of Chongqing, including main characters from the classic Chinese folklore legendary, forum.altaycoins.com Journey to the West.

True to form, DeepSeek developed an appealing storyline set in the year 2145 entitled, "Neon Pilgrimage: The Silicon Sutra" - which sees "a future where Buddhism combines with quantum computing".

It included fancy settings - smoggy skies "pierced by skyscrapers", "holographic lanterns that drift above neon-lit streets" and "ancient temples nestled between quantum server farms".

It likewise brilliantly reimagined traditional heroes Sun Wukong as "an ironical, self-aware AI housed in a stolen fight body", Zhu Bajie as a cyborg club owner "drowning in debt and vices" and Sha Wujing as a "silent hulking android" from the Yangtze River, whose "memory cores become waterlogged and fragmented".

ChatGPT put up a good battle, coming up with an equally remarkable cyberpunk storyline which similarly reimagined "a ragteam of cyber-enhanced misfits, each matching the famous figures of Journey to the West".

"This is a world where AI deities guideline, corporations replace emperors and cybernetic implants are as typical as ancient misconceptions."

Disappointingly, Qwen2.5 fell short in this difficulty - providing a story that appeared more suited for an animation movie.

"The motion picture starts with the awakening of Sun Wukong within a high-tech research study center situated in the heart of Chongqing," it said, then going on to explain the following:

Realising his new reality and "seeking to understand his purpose in this unusual new world", he then gets away and fulfills Zhu Bajie and Sha Wujing - "each battling with their own existential crises".

The trio then embarks on a quest, navigating the streets of Chongqing to safeguard the spiritual "Eternal Scroll" from falling into the incorrect hands.

SO WHICH IS BETTER?

Dr Zhang noted that it was "challenging to make a definitive statement" about which bot was best, including that each showed its own strengths in different areas, "such as language focus, training information and hardware optimization".

Her insight highlights how Chinese AI designs are not merely duplicating Western paradigms, but rather progressing in affordable development techniques - and delivering localised and enhanced results.

In our tests, wavedream.wiki each bot showcased their own special strengths, which certainly made direct contrasts challenging.

DeepSeek's sci-fi motion picture plot showed its innovative flair that produced a more interesting and imaginative narrative as compared to Qwen2.5 and ChatGPT's efforts.

Unsurprisingly, the more established ChatGPT, unburdened by Chinese censorship constraints, supplies precise and accurate actions to concerns about Chinese existing occasions, which gives it an included benefit.

Experts also weighed in on their thoughts after utilizing DeepSeek and other Chinese AI apps.

"DeepSeek is at a drawback when it pertains to censorship constraints," noted Isaac Stone Fish, founder and CEO of the research firm Strategy Risks.

"When given a choice, Chinese users want the non-censored version - similar to anybody else, so I seem like that's a piece missing from it."

Independent Beijing-based consultant Andy Chen Xinran said censorship would not be a dealbreaker when it pertains to AI bots, especially for Chinese users.

"Ninety percent of individuals using the tool are not trying to get a much deeper understanding about Xi Jinping or politically sensitive subjects. They're utilizing it for other productive means," Chen said.