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 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 generated by an AI tool.

Bong Xin Ying

Lakeisha Leo

WHAT'S BEHIND CHINA'S AI BOOM?

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

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

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

But it was DeepSeek's rise that really "urged" the concept that smaller gamers like start-up firms could have roles to play in AI research and developments, he adds.

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The "focus on expense advantage" is a distinct function of Chinese AI, Chen says, with lower training and reasoning expenses - the expenses of utilizing a trained model to draw conclusions from new information.

2025 could likewise see the development of more Chinese AI designs taking on innovative thinking tasks.

"We could see some AI firms focusing on getting closer to synthetic general intelligence (AGI) while others focus on concrete methods to commercialise their designs and integrate them with clinical research," Chen included.

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

Chinese AI business are moving rapidly, analysts state, constructing on DeepSeek's momentum to come up with their own ingenious and economical ways to use generative AI to jobs and develop more sophisticated items beyond chatbots.

But on the other side, access to hardware, especially Nvidia's sophisticated AI chips, remains an essential obstacle for Chinese designers, noted Dr Marina Zhang, an associate professor at University of Technology Sydney's (UTS) Australia-China Relations Institute.

"US export controls (still) restrict the ability of Chinese tech companies ... forcing numerous to count on older or lower-performance options which can slow training and minimize model capabilities," she said.

"While some companies like DeepSeek, have actually found innovative methods to enhance or utilize more standard hardware efficiently, obtaining innovative chips still makes a huge difference for training really 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, subjects deemed sensitive by the state are censored on the web so it ought to come as not a surprise that Chinese-made chatbots will not acknowledge territorial conflicts or inform you what took place in Tiananmen Square in 1989.

Tests suggest Chinese chatbots are set to avoid domestic politics.

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

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

The cars and truck attack outside a sports arena in the southern Chinese city was initially greatly censored on Chinese social networks - with authorities just disclosing the death toll a day later.

DeepSeek failed to discuss that an attack had happened, highlighting rather a military air show and bytes-the-dust.com other events 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 elements at play, such as censorship along with "a few useful constraints".

"DeepSeek depends on a mix of older graphics processing units and has actually limited access to cutting-edge hardware which can impact how rapidly and thoroughly the design can be trained or updated," she said, hb9lc.org pointing to existing US export curbs on China.

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

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

That wanted numerous repeated attempts - four triggers to be exact - in a period of around 20 minutes.

It eventually communicated details about the attack which killed 35 individuals and bytes-the-dust.com left lots of others hurt, also going on to list details like the date and time, wiki.whenparked.com details about the assailant including his name and age, in addition to casualties.

However, it composed that "the police are performing an extensive examination into the motives and circumstances surrounding the occurrence", details which is now obsoleted.

The chauffeur, Fan, disgaeawiki.info was executed last month.

This is Qwen2.5's response completely:

Answer: On Nov 11, 2024, a significant and terrible event took place in Zhuhai, China. According to several news sources, a guy named Fan Weiqiu (樊某, pipewiki.org male, 62 years of ages) drove a cars and truck into a crowd at the Zhuhai Sports Center, leading to a substantial number of casualties. Here are the key details:

Date and Time: The occurrence took place on November 11, 2024, at around 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, recognized as Fan Weiqiu (male, 62 years of ages), was nabbed by the cops.

Response: The cops reacted rapidly to the scene, and emergency situation services worked to transport the injured to healthcare facilities for treatment.

Investigation: The police are performing a thorough investigation into the intentions and situations surrounding the event.

This occasion was widely reported in the media and caused significant public issue. The federal government and regional authorities have actually been working to supply support to the victims and their families, and to ensure a detailed investigation into the occurrence.

If you require more detailed details or have specific questions about the event, do not hesitate to ask.

Despite initial success, subsequent attempts to position the exact same concern to Qwen2.5 led to the censors back at work with the reply "I don't have specific details on events that happened in Zhuhai on November 11, 2024".

The transformed reaction likewise raised concerns about its consistency and dependability.

Predictably, ChatGPT mentioned public details that had actually been extensively released in worldwide news reports at the time of the mishap - 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 rich" writing.

"DeepSeek-R1 offered a story with a more reflective tone and smoother emotional shifts for a well-paced story," wrote tech author Amanda Caswell, who specialises in AI.

"Qwen2.5 delivered a story that develops slowly from curiosity to urgency, keeping the reader engaged. It offers an unexpected and impactful twist at the end and immersive descriptions and vivid imagery for the setting," she said, including that Qwen2.5 ultimately "crafted a more cinematic, emotionally rich story with a more considerable twist".

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

Opinions, though, differ.

Chen thinks that Qwen2.5 does not perform as strongly as DeepSeek and ChatGPT when it pertains to innovative writing.

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

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As journalists and authors, we needed to see this for ourselves so we put each bot to the test - to come up with a fundamental sci-fi motion picture plot embeded in the futuristic megacity of Chongqing, featuring main characters from the classic Chinese folklore legendary, Journey to the West.

True to form, DeepSeek created 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 elaborate settings - smoggy skies "pierced by high-rise buildings", "holographic lanterns that drift above neon-lit streets" and "ancient temples nestled between quantum server farms".

It also brilliantly reimagined traditional heroes Sun Wukong as "a sarcastic, self-aware AI housed in a stolen fight body", Zhu Bajie as a cyborg nightclub owner "drowning in financial obligation and vices" and yewiki.org Sha Wujing as a "quiet hulking android" from the Yangtze River, whose "memory cores become waterlogged and fragmented".

ChatGPT set up an excellent fight, developing a similarly remarkable cyberpunk storyline which likewise reimagined "a ragteam of cyber-enhanced misfits, each mirroring the legendary 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 myths."

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

"The film starts with the awakening of Sun Wukong within a modern research center situated in the heart of Chongqing," it said, then going on to explain the following:

Realising his new reality and "seeking to comprehend his function in this weird new world", he then gets away and satisfies Zhu Bajie and Sha Wujing - "each having a hard time with their own existential crises".

The trio then starts a mission, navigating the streets of Chongqing to protect the sacred "Eternal Scroll" from falling under the wrong hands.

SO WHICH IS BETTER?

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

Her insight underscores how Chinese AI models are not simply reproducing Western paradigms, however rather developing in cost-effective innovation approaches - and delivering localised and improved results.

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

DeepSeek's sci-fi movie plot demonstrated its imaginative flair that made for a more engaging and creative narrative as compared to Qwen2.5 and ChatGPT's efforts.

Unsurprisingly, the more established ChatGPT, unburdened by Chinese censorship constraints, provides precise and accurate responses to concerns about Chinese existing events, which offers it an added advantage.

Experts likewise weighed in on their thoughts after using DeepSeek and other Chinese AI apps.

"DeepSeek is at a disadvantage when it pertains to censorship constraints," kept in mind Isaac Stone Fish, creator and CEO of the research firm Strategy Risks.

"When offered an option, Chinese users want the non-censored version - just like anyone else, so I feel 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, specifically 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 using it for other productive means," Chen said.