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Weekly AI Token Processing (Trillions)
Comparison of AI model performance by region as of April 2025.
Primary Sources
America builds AI, China uses it. That gap may decide the future
When it comes to artificial intelligence, the United States still dominates the headlines – and, by most conventional measures, the technology itself. American institutions continue to produce a large share of high-impact AI research, and private investment reached over US$109 billion in 2024, nearly 12 times China’s total, according to the Stanford Institute for Human-Centred AI.At the same time, the economics of AI are rapidly improving. Training and deployment costs have fallen dramatically in recent years, making large-scale adoption increasingly viable across industries. By these metrics, the US appears to be winning the AI race. But there is growing evidence this may not be the race that matters most. Because, while the US excels at building AI, China is moving more decisively to use it.Across industries – from logistics to healthcare – China is not simply adopting AI tools. It is reorganising systems around them. By 2024, China had more than 600 million registered generative AI users and hundreds of models deployed across real-world environments, from hospitals to logistics systems. Adoption is not limited to experimentation; it is embedded in operations.This difference is not primarily about technological capability. It is about implementation.In the US, many organisations are attempting to integrate AI into systems designed decades ago. Nowhere is this more visible than in logistics. The US trucking sector – responsible for moving roughly 70 per cent of the nation’s goods – has access to advanced AI tools but often struggles to translate that access into meaningful transformation. Instead of redesigning workflows, companies frequently layer AI onto legacy infrastructure built in an era of fax machines and dial-up internet, producing incremental gains rather than systemic change.Economists have seen this pattern before. During the electrification of manufacturing, factories that simply replaced steam engines with electric motors saw little productivity improvement. Real gains only came when companies reorganised entire production systems around electricity – a dynamic often associated with economist Robert Solow and later expanded by Erik Brynjolfsson in the context of digital transformation.
China's Open-Source AI Models Close Gap With US as Europe Faces Fallout ...
China is rapidly emerging as a force in Artificial Intelligence services, with its open-source models processing a volume of tokens comparable to US counterparts, while Europe faces growing economic and geopolitical friction over the ongoing conflict between the US and Iran, according to a research report by Jefferies.The brokerage firm said that data from OpenRouter shows China's top nine AI models processed 4.37 trillion tokens in the week ended April 26, compared with 4.98 trillion for US models. This follows a record 12.96 trillion tokens processed by Chinese models in the week ended April 5, outpacing US models' 3.03 trillion. The trend highlights China's ability to leverage cheap energy and computing power to export digitally-delivered knowledge services.China ranked as the world's sixth-largest exporter of digitally-delivered services in 2025, with exports rising at an annualized 15.2 per cent over 20 years to USD 245 billion, up from USD 14.4 billion in 2005. While this is still below India's USD 328 billion, the trajectory reflects China's growing role beyond manufactured goods.Meanwhile, European frustration over the US-Iran conflict is becoming public. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz this week criticized Washington's strategy, saying "the Iranians are clearly stronger than expected" and that "the Americans clearly have no truly convincing strategy." The comments mark a rare break from Berlin's traditionally cautious stance toward Washington since the Ukraine war, when Germany cut off cheap Russian energy in favor of US LNG.The brokerage added that the economic toll is visible in Germany's GfK consumer climate index, which fell 5.2 points to minus 33.3 in May, the lowest since February 2023 and the sharpest monthly decline since October 2022. European leaders are also questioning the continued use of over 40 US military bases hosting 85,000 troops, with some floating the idea of negotiating directly with Iran to secure access through the Strait of Hormuz, through which 34 per cent of seaborne crude oil and 19 per cent of LNG passes.Domestically, US polling shows 61 per cent disapprove of military strikes on Iran and 63 per cent disapprove of Trump's economic handling, adding pressure for a diplomatic off-ramp. The situation is compounded by the UAE's decision to exit OPEC on May 1, signaling growing fractures within the Gulf amid the conflict. Sign up for Open Magazine's ad-free experienceEnjoy uninterrupted access to premium content and insight...
How China Is Winning the Global AI Race - Foreign Policy
Analysis How China Is Winning the Global AI Race Cutting-edge U.S. models are too expensive for much of the world.
China, US shaping 'complementary competition' in AI
China and the United States are shaping a "complementary competition" across the global artificial intelligence value chain, an industry report said on Tuesday, underscoring that the rivalry between the world's two largest economic powers is increasingly defined by structural interdependence. According to the Global AI Enterprise Technology Innovation Index Report 2026, released by the ...
