toolhub

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 produced 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 "strategically crucial" and its venture 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 investments in Chinese AI sped up after ChatGPT took off in 2022 and revealed pledges of real-world organization applications, Chen informed CNA.

But it was DeepSeek's rise that really "encouraged" the idea that smaller players like start-up companies could have roles to play in AI research and developments, archmageriseswiki.com he adds.

'A lot is up in the air': Is Chinese company DeepSeek's AI design as impactful as it claims?

Commentary: DeepSeek - how a Chinese AI business simply altered the rules of tech-geopolitics

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

2025 might likewise see the introduction of more Chinese AI models taking on innovative reasoning tasks.

"We could see some AI companies focusing on getting closer to synthetic general intelligence (AGI) while others concentrate on concrete methods to commercialise their designs and incorporate them with scientific research study," Chen added.

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

Chinese AI business are moving rapidly, experts say, building on DeepSeek's momentum to come up with their own innovative and economical methods to use generative AI to tasks and develop advanced items beyond chatbots.

But on the other hand, access to high-end hardware, especially Nvidia's sophisticated AI chips, remains a crucial 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 capability of Chinese tech business ... forcing many to depend on older or lower-performance options which can slow training and decrease design abilities," she said.

"While some companies like DeepSeek, have actually discovered innovative methods to optimize or use more standard hardware effectively, obtaining cutting-edge chips still makes a big difference for training huge AI designs."

DeepSeek-Nvidia chips: Singapore says it expects companies to adhere to its laws

US looking into whether DeepSeek utilized limited AI chips obtained through other nations, source says

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 considered delicate by the state are censored on the internet so it should come as not a surprise that Chinese-made chatbots will not acknowledge territorial disagreements or inform you what occurred in Tiananmen Square in 1989.

Tests recommend 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 mathematics, coding, and reasoning issues instead!"

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

The automobile attack outside a sports arena 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 mention that an attack had taken location, highlighting rather a military air program and other occasions that had happened in the city like songs' day shopping sales as well as sports and cultural activities.

Dr Zhang believes that it may be a mix of elements at play, such as censorship in addition to "a few useful constraints".

"DeepSeek depends on a mix of older graphics processing systems and has actually limited access to innovative hardware which can affect how rapidly and thoroughly the model can be trained or updated," she said, pointing to existing US export curbs on China.

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

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

That was after several duplicated efforts - 4 prompts to be precise - in a period of around 20 minutes.

It ultimately relayed details about the attack which killed 35 individuals and left lots of others injured, likewise going on to note details like the date and time, details about the assailant including his name and age, as well as casualties.

However, it wrote that "the cops are performing a thorough examination into the motives and circumstances surrounding the incident", details which is now obsoleted.

The chauffeur, Fan, was performed 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 multiple news sources, a guy called Fan Weiqiu (樊某, male, 62 years old) drove a cars and truck into a crowd at the Zhuhai Sports Center, resulting in a considerable number of casualties. Here are the crucial 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 motorist, determined as Fan Weiqiu (male, 62 years of ages), was apprehended by the authorities.

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

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

This occasion was commonly reported in the media and triggered substantial public issue. The federal government and local authorities have actually been working to supply assistance to the victims and their families, and to ensure a detailed investigation into the event.

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

Despite preliminary success, subsequent efforts to posture the exact same concern 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 transformed reaction also raised questions about its consistency and dependability.

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

WHICH IS MORE CREATIVE?

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

"DeepSeek-R1 offered 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 builds gradually from curiosity to seriousness, keeping the reader engaged. It provides an unanticipated and impactful twist at the end and immersive descriptions and brilliant images for the setting," she said, including that Qwen2.5 ultimately "crafted a more cinematic, mentally abundant story with a more substantial twist".

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

Opinions, though, differ.

Chen believes 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 tasks, but we can also see that it is refraining from doing as highly as others in imaginative writing," he informed CNA.

Related:

China's brand-new face of AI: Who is DeepSeek founder Liang Wenfeng?

'Made in China': Pride, enjoyable surprise from Chinese netizens as DeepSeek shocks international AI scene

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

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

It included sophisticated settings - smoggy skies "pierced by high-rise buildings", "holographic lanterns that drift above neon-lit streets" and "ancient temples nestled in between quantum server farms".

It likewise remarkably reimagined standard heroes Sun Wukong as "a sarcastic, self-aware AI housed in a taken 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 installed a good fight, creating an equally significant cyberpunk storyline which similarly reimagined "a ragteam of cyber-enhanced misfits, each mirroring the famous figures of Journey to the West".

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

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

"The film 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 reality and "looking for to understand his function in this strange brand-new world", he then leaves and wiki.dulovic.tech meets Zhu Bajie and Sha Wujing - "each having problem with their own existential crises".

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

SO WHICH IS BETTER?

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

Her insight highlights how Chinese AI models are not simply duplicating Western paradigms, however rather progressing in economical development approaches - and providing localised and improved outcomes.

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

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

Unsurprisingly, the more established ChatGPT, unburdened by Chinese censorship constraints, supplies precise and accurate reactions to concerns about Chinese present occasions, which provides it an added advantage.

Experts also weighed in on their ideas after using DeepSeek and other Chinese AI apps.

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

"When provided a choice, Chinese users want the non-censored version - much like anybody else, so I feel like that's a piece missing from it."

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

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