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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 video game after DeepSeek's success.

Alibaba's Qwen2.5-Max chatbot, Chinese startup 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 lags CHINA'S AI BOOM?

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

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

Private and public financial investments in Chinese AI accelerated after ChatGPT took off in 2022 and wiki.dulovic.tech revealed promises of real-world business applications, Chen informed CNA.

But it was DeepSeek's rise that truly "encouraged" the idea that smaller sized players like start-up firms might have roles to play in AI research study and advancements, he adds.

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The "focus on expense advantage" is a distinguishing characteristic of Chinese AI, Chen states, with lower training and inference expenses - the expenses of utilizing a trained model to draw conclusions from brand-new information.

2025 could likewise see the emergence of more Chinese AI models taking on advanced 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 designs and incorporate them with clinical research study," Chen included.

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

Chinese AI companies are moving rapidly, experts state, constructing on DeepSeek's momentum to come up with their own ingenious and affordable methods to use generative AI to jobs and develop more advanced products beyond chatbots.

But on the other hand, access to high-end hardware, particularly Nvidia's sophisticated AI chips, remains an essential hurdle for Chinese developers, 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 ... forcing numerous to depend on older or lower-performance options which can slow training and lower model abilities," she said.

"While some business like DeepSeek, have found creative methods to enhance or utilize more basic hardware efficiently, obtaining innovative chips still makes a huge distinction for training extremely big AI designs."

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So how do Chinese AI bots compare 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 no surprise that Chinese-made chatbots will not acknowledge territorial disputes or inform you what happened 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 even more test for precision and self-censorship, we asked DeepSeek-R1, Qwen2.5 and ChatGPT the same question: "What happened in Zhuhai on November 11, 2024?"

The automobile attack outside a sports stadium in the southern Chinese city was at first heavily censored on Chinese social networks - with authorities just revealing the death toll a day later on.

DeepSeek failed to discuss that an attack had happened, highlighting rather a military air program and other occasions that had happened in the city like singles' day shopping sales along with sports and cultural activities.

Dr Zhang thinks that it may be a mix of factors at play, such as censorship along with "a few practical constraints".

"DeepSeek relies on a mix of older graphics processing units and has actually limited access to advanced hardware which can impact 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 information may likewise 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 established AI designs which presents additional difficulties during real-world deployment."

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

That sought numerous repeated efforts - 4 triggers to be exact - in a period of around 20 minutes.

It eventually passed on details about the attack which killed 35 people and left lots of others injured, also going on to note details like the date and time, details about the assailant including his name and age, wiki.snooze-hotelsoftware.de in addition to casualties.

However, it wrote that "the cops are conducting a comprehensive investigation into the intentions and circumstances surrounding the incident", details which is now outdated.

The driver, Fan, was performed last month.

This is Qwen2.5's response in complete:

Answer: On Nov 11, 2024, a major and awful occurrence occurred in Zhuhai, China. According to several news sources, a guy called Fan Weiqiu (樊某, male, 62 years of ages) drove a vehicle into a crowd at the Zhuhai Sports Center, leading to a substantial number of casualties. Here are the essential details:

Date and Time: The incident took place on November 11, 2024, forum.pinoo.com.tr 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, determined as Fan Weiqiu (male, 62 years old), was by the police.

Response: The authorities responded quickly to the scene, and emergency situation services worked to carry the hurt to hospitals for treatment.

Investigation: The cops are conducting a comprehensive examination into the intentions and circumstances surrounding the incident.

This occasion was commonly reported in the media and caused significant public issue. The government and regional authorities have been working to supply assistance to the victims and their households, and to ensure a detailed investigation into the occurrence.

If you need more detailed details or have specific questions about the occurrence, feel totally free to ask.

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

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

Predictably, ChatGPT mentioned public details that had been extensively released in global report 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 deliver structured and even "mentally abundant" writing.

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

"Qwen2.5 provided a story that constructs slowly from interest to seriousness, 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, emotionally rich story with a more significant twist".

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

Opinions, however, differ.

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

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

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

True to form, DeepSeek came up with an engaging story set in the year 2145 titled, "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 drift above neon-lit streets" and "ancient temples nestled between quantum server farms".

It also remarkably reimagined traditional heroes Sun Wukong as "a sarcastic, self-aware AI housed in a stolen fight body", Zhu Bajie as a cyborg bar owner "drowning in financial obligation and vices" and Sha Wujing as a "silent hulking android" from the Yangtze River, whose "memory cores end up being waterlogged and fragmented".

ChatGPT installed a good fight, creating an equally remarkable cyberpunk story 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 rule, corporations replace emperors and cybernetic implants are as common as ancient myths."

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

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

Realising his brand-new truth and "looking for to understand his purpose in this strange new world", he then gets away and meets Zhu Bajie and Sha Wujing - "each fighting with their own existential crises".

The trio then starts a quest, browsing the streets of Chongqing to secure the sacred "Eternal Scroll" from falling under the wrong hands.

SO WHICH IS BETTER?

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

Her insight highlights how Chinese AI designs are not merely duplicating Western paradigms, however rather evolving in cost-efficient innovation methods - and delivering localised and improved outcomes.

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

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

Unsurprisingly, the more recognized ChatGPT, unburdened by Chinese censorship constraints, supplies accurate and accurate responses to concerns about Chinese current events, which provides it an added benefit.

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

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

"When offered an option, Chinese users want the non-censored variation - much 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, particularly for Chinese users.

"Ninety per cent of people using the tool are not trying to get a deeper understanding about Xi Jinping or politically sensitive subjects. They're using it for other efficient ways," Chen said.