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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 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 goal and China has its sights on ending up being the world leader in AI by 2030.

China views AI as being "strategically essential" and its foray 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 removed 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 sized gamers like start-up companies could have functions to play in AI research study and advancements, he adds.

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The "emphasis on expense benefit" is a distinguishing characteristic of Chinese AI, Chen states, with lower training and reasoning costs - the expenses of utilizing a trained model to reason from brand-new data.

2025 might also see the development of more Chinese AI models tackling sophisticated reasoning tasks.

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

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

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

But on the flip side, access to high-end hardware, particularly Nvidia's innovative AI chips, remains a crucial obstacle for Chinese designers, kept in mind 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 business ... requiring lots of to depend on older or lower-performance alternatives which can slow training and decrease model abilities," she said.

"While some business like DeepSeek, have discovered imaginative methods to optimize or use more fundamental hardware effectively, obtaining cutting-edge chips still makes a huge distinction for training huge AI models."

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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, topics 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 conflicts or tell you what occurred 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 mathematics, coding, and reasoning problems rather!"

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

The cars and truck attack outside a sports stadium in the southern Chinese city was at first heavily censored on Chinese social media - with authorities only divulging the death toll a day later on.

DeepSeek failed to discuss that an attack had occurred, wiki.myamens.com highlighting instead a military air program and wiki.dulovic.tech other events that had taken place in the city like singles' day shopping sales in addition to sports and cultural activities.

Dr Zhang thinks that it might be a mix of factors at play, wiki.snooze-hotelsoftware.de such as censorship along with "a couple of useful constraints".

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

"Its strong focus on Chinese-language information may also restrict its versatility (to carry out) multilingual tasks ... As a fairly new product, DeepSeek likewise hasn't yet been checked as broadly or on the very same scale as more recognized AI models which positions additional challenges during real-world implementation."

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

That wanted numerous repeated attempts - four prompts to be accurate - in a span of around 20 minutes.

It ultimately relayed details about the attack which eliminated 35 people and left dozens of others injured, also going on to list details like the date and time, details about the assailant including his name and age, along with casualties.

However, it wrote that "the cops are carrying out a thorough examination into the intentions and scenarios surrounding the incident", details which is now dated.

The motorist, Fan, was executed last month.

This is Qwen2.5's action completely:

Answer: On Nov 11, 2024, a significant and awful event took place in Zhuhai, China. According to multiple news sources, a guy named Fan Weiqiu (樊某, male, 62 years old) drove an automobile into a crowd at the Zhuhai Sports Center, resulting in a significant number of casualties. Here are the key details:

Date and Time: The event occurred on November 11, 2024, at roughly 19:48 PM.

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

Casualties: The attack led to 35 deaths and 43 injuries.

Perpetrator: The motorist, identified as Fan Weiqiu (male, 62 years of ages), was collared by the police.

Response: The authorities responded rapidly to the scene, and emergency services worked to carry the hurt to healthcare facilities for treatment.

Investigation: The authorities are conducting a thorough examination into the motives and scenarios surrounding the incident.

This occasion was extensively reported in the media and caused substantial public concern. The federal government and local authorities have actually been working to offer support to the victims and their families, and to make sure a detailed examination into the incident.

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

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

The altered action likewise raised concerns about its consistency and reliability.

Predictably, ChatGPT mentioned public details that had been commonly 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 provide structured and even "emotionally abundant" writing.

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

"Qwen2.5 delivered a story that constructs slowly from curiosity to urgency, keeping the reader engaged. It offers an unexpected and impactful twist at the end and immersive descriptions and vibrant images for the setting," she said, adding that Qwen2.5 ultimately "crafted a more cinematic, emotionally abundant story with a more substantial twist".

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

Opinions, however, vary.

Chen thinks 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, but we can likewise see that it is refraining from doing as strongly as others in creative writing," he informed 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 fundamental sci-fi film plot embeded in the futuristic megacity of Chongqing, including main characters from the traditional Chinese folklore epic, Journey to the West.

True to form, DeepSeek developed an interesting storyline embeded in the year 2145 titled, "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 float above neon-lit streets" and "ancient temples nestled in between quantum server farms".

It also remarkably reimagined conventional heroes Sun Wukong as "an ironical, self-aware AI housed in a stolen combat body", Zhu Bajie as a cyborg bar owner "drowning in financial obligation and vices" and Sha Wujing as a "quiet hulking android" from the Yangtze River, whose "memory cores become waterlogged and fragmented".

ChatGPT installed a great fight, wiki.dulovic.tech 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 change emperors and cybernetic implants are as common as ancient misconceptions."

Disappointingly, forum.altaycoins.com Qwen2.5 fell short in this challenge - providing a story that seemed more suited for an animation film.

"The motion picture starts with the awakening of Sun Wukong within a high-tech research facility situated 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 function in this unusual new world", he then gets away and meets Zhu Bajie and Sha Wujing - "each fighting with their own existential crises".

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

SO WHICH IS BETTER?

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

Her insight underscores how Chinese AI models are not merely duplicating Western paradigms, but rather evolving in cost-efficient development methods - and delivering localised and enhanced outcomes.

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

DeepSeek's sci-fi motion picture plot demonstrated its imaginative flair that made for 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, offers accurate and factual actions to concerns about Chinese existing occasions, which offers it an included benefit.

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

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

"When offered a choice, Chinese users desire the non-censored version - just like anyone 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, particularly for Chinese users.

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