ByteDance bets big on AI with 25% spending increase in 2026

ByteDance has announced plans to boost infrastructure spending on artificial intelligence infrastructure this year in a major push to dominate the competitive AI landscape.

The spending is expected to surge by 25 percent to 200 billion yuan or $29.4 billion in the wake of skyrocketing memory chip prices.

According to the South China Morning Post, the TikTok owner has raised its AI capital expenditure budget from a previous target of 160 billion yuan set last year. As per sources privy to the matter, Chinese tech giant now intends to allocate a greater share of this investment toward domestically produced AI chips.

To challenge the dominance of American tech companies, Beijing is also encouraging tech companies to prioritize domestic technology over the foreign one. The local chip-making capacity will not only give China an edge in its AI rivalry with the US but also position the country in a tech-driven world.

Last month, China also restricted US funding in Chinese technology firms, including some of the country’s highest-profile AI pioneers, from accepting Washington funding without government capital.

Even despite US’ greenlight to export Nvidia chips to China, Beijing has not yet given permission to local companies to import them.

ByteDance has also expanded its influence in other countries as well. The company received a $25 billion investment approval in Thailand’s data infrastructure, marking it as the company’s largest project announced in Southeast Asia to date. The company is expanding its European footprint with an additional €1 billion (US$1.2 billion) investment for a data center in Finland.

Despite the massive increase in AI spending, the figure stays lower than major US competitors. For instance, Amazon raised their capex estimates to $200 billion, Google and Microsoft ($190 billion) and Meta platforms ($145 billion).