China’s AI Landscape: a free-for-all, not a central plan

what 6000+ filings with regulators reveal

Zilan Qian is a programme associate at the Oxford China Policy Lab and holds a Master’s degree in Social Science of the Internet from the University of Oxford. The dominant narrative about China’s AI race frames it as a government-backed sprint toward AGI capabilities, competing head-to-head with the US frontier. But examining more than 6000 records of generative AI models filed through China’s registry system (updated through November 2025) tells a different story. Since 2023, all public-facing AI models must be filed with regulators before launch — creating an unprecedented window into…

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