AI applications gain momentum as China advances intelligent internet development

The China Intelligent Internet Development Report (2026), the third blue book on intelligent internet compiled by the People's Daily Online Research Institute, was released in Beijing on July 29. (People's Daily Online/Weng Qiyu)

The 2026 Intelligent Internet Blue Book Launch Conference was held in Beijing on July 29, where the "China Intelligent Internet Development Report (2026)," the third intelligent internet blue book compiled by the People's Daily Online Research Institute, was officially released. Government officials, experts, scholars and industry representatives attended the event to discuss how to further advance intelligent internet development and foster new forms of intelligent economy during the opening year of the 15th Five-Year Plan.

"Mainstream media should not simply wait for technology to empower them; instead, they should actively embrace intelligent transformation and shoulder their responsibilities in the era of digital intelligence," said Fan Zhengwei, president of People's Daily Online.

He added that intelligent internet is creating new opportunities for mainstream media by reshaping access to information, reassessing the value of data and redefining the role of media organizations.

Speakers at the conference also highlighted the value of the blue book in documenting China's internet development and supporting future policy and industry practices.

"The 'Intelligent Internet Blue Book' brings together the insights and expertise of experts and scholars from government, industry, academia and research institutions. It is not only an authoritative record of China's intelligent internet development from its early conceptual stage to ecosystem growth, but also a bridge connecting policy with industry and theory with practice," said Yao Dongmei, vice president of Social Sciences Academic Press. "It provides important intellectual support for promoting the high-quality development of China's intelligent internet and advancing Chinese modernization."

Tang Weihong, vice president of People's Daily Online, said intelligent internet has become a core engine for fostering new quality productive forces and driving industrial transformation.

According to the report, by the end of 2025, China had released more than 1,500 large AI models, while 748 generative AI services had completed filing procedures and generative AI users reached 602 million.

Driven by the rapid expansion of AI technologies and applications, China's AI industry has continued to grow. The country now has more than 6,000 AI enterprises, and the scale of its core AI industry exceeded 1.2 trillion yuan in 2025, up more than 30 percent year on year. Intelligent agents have also entered a stage of rapid development, becoming an important pathway for AI commercialization.

AI integration with the real economy has deepened, with more than 20,000 "5G plus industrial internet" projects developed nationwide. China has built more than 30,000 basic-level smart factories, while AI adoption among manufacturing enterprises above designated size has exceeded 30 percent. In agriculture, 116 national-level smart agriculture projects have been established, covering the entire industrial chain.

The growing adoption of intelligent technologies is also reflected in internet usage patterns. According to data released by global internet traffic monitoring and analysis platform Cloudflare Radar in July 2026, bot traffic accounted for 59.2 percent of China's HTTP requests, surpassing human traffic at 40.8 percent.

Looking ahead, the report predicts that with continued technological innovation and the implementation of the "Artificial Intelligence Plus" initiative, China's intelligent internet development will advance from digital intelligence toward physical intelligence, while the commercialization and large-scale adoption of vertical AI applications will become a key direction of development.

"China is moving forward rapidly in intelligent internet applications," said Liu Yunjie, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering and chief scientist at Purple Mountain Laboratories, adding that the release of the blue book will help advance the country's intelligent internet development.