Alibaba’s "Qwen" App Hits 10 Million Downloads, Challenging ChatGPT in China’s AI Race
Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. has made a thunderous entry into the consumer artificial intelligence market with its newly rebranded app, Qwen, securing over 10 million downloads within just one week of its public beta launch. This rapid adoption rate reportedly outpaces the initial growth trajectories of both OpenAI’s ChatGPT and local rival DeepSeek, signaling strong market demand for a comprehensive AI assistant in mainland China. The immediate impact was felt on the financial markets, with Alibaba’s Hong Kong-listed shares surging nearly 5% on Monday as investors reacted positively to the company's aggressive pivot toward becoming an "AI-first" business under CEO Eddie Wu.
Powered by Alibaba Cloud’s proprietary open-source model family, Qwen is designed to be far more than a simple chatbot; it is positioned as a "super app" for the AI era. Unlike single-purpose tools, Qwen integrates multimodal capabilities such as deep research, image generation, and automated slide creation, catering to both professional productivity and personal lifestyle needs. The company has explicitly stated its intention to benchmark Qwen against global giants like Google’s Gemini and OpenAI’s ChatGPT—services that are currently inaccessible in China—effectively filling a massive void in the domestic market with a homegrown, high-performance alternative.
The strategic vision for Qwen extends beyond conversation, aiming for deep integration with Alibaba's vast ecosystem of services. In the coming months, the app will incorporate "agentic AI" features, allowing it to autonomously perform tasks across Alibaba’s portfolio, including digital mapping, food delivery, travel booking, and shopping on its marquee Taobao marketplace. This evolution from a passive information retriever to an active "lifestyle agent" is a crucial differentiator. By embedding these utilities directly into the chat interface, Alibaba aims to transform Qwen into an indispensable daily tool that bridges the gap between digital queries and real-world actions.
This momentum is not isolated to Alibaba’s core e-commerce unit; its fintech affiliate, Ant Group, is running a parallel and equally successful AI offensive. Ant Group recently launched its own multimodal assistant, LingGuang, which achieved nearly 2 million downloads in just four days, topping the free tool charts on Apple’s China App Store. LingGuang focuses on "vibe coding," a trend allowing non-programmers to build custom software, and complements Qwen’s broader consumer focus. Together, these dual launches demonstrate a coordinated effort by the Alibaba ecosystem to dominate multiple verticals of the generative AI landscape simultaneously.
Market analysts view this rapid user acquisition as a critical valuation driver for Alibaba’s future. Kenny Ng, a strategist at China Everbright Securities, noted that the company's ability to leverage Qwen for its consumer business will be a key factor in how investors benchmark Alibaba against pure-play AI companies like OpenAI. The market is eagerly awaiting further details on monetization and integration strategies, which are expected to be a focal point during Alibaba’s upcoming quarterly earnings call. The success of Qwen suggests that Alibaba is successfully transitioning its massive cloud and data infrastructure into tangible consumer products.
Looking ahead, the battle for AI supremacy in China is heating up, but Alibaba has established an early and formidable lead with Qwen. By leveraging its existing dominance in e-commerce and cloud services, the company is uniquely positioned to create a "flywheel effect" where AI usage drives transaction volume, and transaction data further refines the AI. As the app prepares for future international rollouts to compete globally, Qwen represents Alibaba’s most significant bet yet that the future of the internet will be defined not by search engines or app stores, but by intelligent, all-encompassing AI agents.