China’s AI milestone: ByteDance’s Doubao chatbot hits 100M users during Lunar New Year

ByteDance’s Doubao chatbot has crossed over 100 million daily active users during the Lunar New Year holiday, strengthening China’s position in the competitive AI race.

According to data published by AICPB.com, which tracks the performance of Chinese AI chatbots, the Doubao app tops 100 million users on February 16. This is four times as many people using the app compared to just a few weeks earlier.

The app’s popularity surged because it collaborated with the CCTV Spring Festival Gala, one of the most-watched TV specials in China.

According to ByteDance, the app handled over 1.9 billion AI questions during the broadcast.

Other companies, despite spending a handful of money, failed to amass the much higher daily active user numbers. For instance, Alibaba spent around 3 billion yuan to promote its Gwen app but did not gather more than 40 million daily active users (DAU), peaking at 30 million on New Year’s Eve.

As per data, in early February Qwen had less than 10 million DAUs.

Similarly, Tencent boosted its Yuanbao chatbot by giving away 1 billion yuan in coupons. As a result, the app’s DAU grew from 20 million in early February to a high of 50 million by February 16.

“Doubao gained the most visibility through the Spring Festival Gala, Yuanbao attracted users quickly with cash incentives, but both face user retention challenges after the holiday peak. Qwen, however, showed the strongest retention by focusing on practical, everyday use cases,” AICPB said.