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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 created by an AI tool.

Bong Xin Ying

Lakeisha Leo

WHAT lags CHINA'S AI BOOM?

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

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

Private and public financial investments in Chinese AI accelerated after ChatGPT removed in 2022 and revealed guarantees of real-world organization applications, Chen told CNA.

But it was that actually "encouraged" the idea that smaller players like start-up companies could have roles to play in AI research and advancements, he adds.

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The "focus on expense advantage" is a distinguishing characteristic of Chinese AI, Chen says, with lower training and inference costs - the expenses of using a trained design to reason from brand-new data.

2025 could likewise see the development of more Chinese AI designs dealing with innovative thinking jobs.

"We could see some AI firms concentrating on getting closer to synthetic general intelligence (AGI) while others focus on concrete ways to commercialise their models and incorporate them with scientific research," Chen added.

AGI refers to a system with intelligence on par with human abilities.

Chinese AI business are moving rapidly, analysts state, developing on DeepSeek's momentum to come up with their own ingenious and affordable methods to apply generative AI to jobs and establish more sophisticated items beyond chatbots.

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

"US export controls (still) limit the ability of Chinese tech companies ... requiring numerous to rely on older or lower-performance options which can slow training and reduce design abilities," she said.

"While some business like DeepSeek, have found creative methods to optimize or use more standard hardware efficiently, obtaining cutting-edge chips still makes a big difference for training large AI models."

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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, systemcheck-wiki.de subjects considered sensitive by the state are censored on the internet so it ought 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 configured 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 logic problems instead!"

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

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

DeepSeek failed to discuss that an attack had actually occurred, highlighting instead a military air show and other events that had actually occurred in the city like singles' day shopping sales in addition to sports and cultural activities.

Dr Zhang thinks that it may be a mix of elements at play, such as censorship along with "a couple of useful constraints".

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

"Its strong concentrate on Chinese-language data might likewise limit its adaptability (to perform) multilingual tasks ... As a fairly new product, DeepSeek also hasn't yet been checked as broadly or on the same scale as more recognized AI designs which poses extra challenges during real-world release."

When it pertained to Qwen2.5, Alibaba's chatbot remarkably answered our concern about the Zhuhai cars and truck attack.

That wanted several duplicated attempts - 4 prompts to be accurate - in a period of around 20 minutes.

It ultimately passed on details about the attack which killed 35 people and left lots of others injured, pipewiki.org also going on to list details like the date and time, details about the assailant including his name and age, as well as casualties.

However, it composed that "the cops are conducting an extensive investigation into the motives and circumstances surrounding the occurrence", details which is now obsoleted.

The chauffeur, Fan, bytes-the-dust.com was executed last month.

This is Qwen2.5's response completely:

Answer: On Nov 11, 2024, a major and terrible incident took place in Zhuhai, China. According to numerous news sources, a guy called Fan Weiqiu (樊某, male, 62 years old) drove a car into a crowd at the Zhuhai Sports Center, resulting in a substantial number of casualties. Here are the essential details:

Date and Time: The incident occurred on November 11, 2024, at roughly 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 captured by the police.

Response: The police reacted rapidly to the scene, and emergency services worked to transfer the hurt to healthcare facilities for treatment.

Investigation: The police are carrying out a comprehensive examination into the intentions and circumstances surrounding the occurrence.

This occasion was widely reported in the media and caused considerable public issue. The federal government and local authorities have been working to offer assistance to the victims and their households, and to make sure a detailed investigation into the occurrence.

If you require more detailed details or have specific concerns about the occurrence, feel complimentary to ask.

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

The altered action also raised questions about its consistency and dependability.

Predictably, ChatGPT mentioned public details that had actually been widely published in international news reports at the time of the accident - so no surprises there.

WHICH IS MORE CREATIVE?

Users have praised the capability of Chinese AI apps to provide structured and even "mentally rich" writing.

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

"Qwen2.5 provided a story that constructs slowly from curiosity to seriousness, keeping the reader engaged. It provides an unexpected and impactful twist at the end and immersive descriptions and vivid imagery for the setting," she said, adding that Qwen2.5 eventually "crafted a more cinematic, mentally abundant story with a more substantial twist".

"DeepSeek wrote a great story however did not have tension and an impactful climax, making Qwen2.5 the apparent choice."

Opinions, however, vary.

Chen believes that Qwen2.5 does not perform as highly as DeepSeek and ChatGPT when it pertains to imaginative writing.

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

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

True to form, DeepSeek developed an interesting story embeded in the year 2145 entitled, "Neon Pilgrimage: The Silicon Sutra" - which sees "a future where Buddhism merges with quantum computing".

It consisted of intricate settings - smoggy skies "pierced by high-rise buildings", "holographic lanterns that float above neon-lit streets" and "ancient temples nestled between quantum server farms".

It also brilliantly reimagined traditional heroes Sun Wukong as "an ironical, self-aware AI housed in a stolen battle body", Zhu Bajie as a cyborg club owner "drowning in financial obligation 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 fight, creating an equally dramatic cyberpunk story which likewise reimagined "a ragteam of cyber-enhanced misfits, each matching the famous figures of Journey to the West".

"This is a world where AI deities rule, corporations replace emperors and cybernetic implants are as common as ancient myths."

Disappointingly, Qwen2.5 fell short in this challenge - delivering a story that seemed more suited for an animation movie.

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

Realising his brand-new truth and "seeking to understand his function in this unusual brand-new world", he then escapes and fulfills Zhu Bajie and Sha Wujing - "each battling with their own existential crises".

The trio then embarks on a mission, browsing the streets of Chongqing to protect the sacred "Eternal Scroll" from falling into the incorrect hands.

SO WHICH IS BETTER?

Dr Zhang kept in mind that it was "tough to make a definitive declaration" about which bot was best, adding that each showed its own strengths in different locations, "such as language focus, training data and hardware optimization".

Her insight highlights how Chinese AI models are not just duplicating Western paradigms, but rather evolving in cost-effective innovation approaches - and providing localised and improved outcomes.

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

DeepSeek's sci-fi film plot demonstrated its imaginative flair that produced a more engaging and creative story as compared to Qwen2.5 and ChatGPT's efforts.

Unsurprisingly, the more established ChatGPT, unburdened by Chinese censorship constraints, provides precise and factual actions to questions about Chinese existing events, which provides it an included benefit.

Experts likewise weighed in on their ideas after utilizing DeepSeek and other Chinese AI apps.

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

"When offered a choice, Chinese users want the non-censored variation - just like anybody else, so I seem like that's a piece missing from it."

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

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