Alibaba Unveils Qwen3.8-Max AI Model with 2.4 Trillion Parameters, Escalating U.S.-China AI Race
22 Sources
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China's Alibaba takes another swipe at America's AI supremacy
Chinese tech giant Alibaba released what it says is its largest and "most capable AI model to date," claiming performance rivalling the best systems from US frontier labs Anthropic and OpenAI, as well as domestic rivals like Moonshot AI's Kimi K3. Alibaba said it was making the model, Qwen3.8-Max,
[2]
Alibaba takes aim at OpenAI and Anthropic with Qwen3.8-Max launch
The new open-weight model targets enterprise software engineering and multimodal workloads as enterprises weigh deployment efficiency alongside AI model performance. Alibaba on Monday introduced Qwen3.8-Max, its largest artificial intelligence model to date, expanding its enterprise AI portfolio
[3]
DeepSeek's new AI model is by far the cheapest of well-known models to run, research firm says
BEIJING, Aug 3 (Reuters) - A version of Chinese startup DeepSeek's flagship AI model is by far the least expensive to run on benchmark tests among well-known models globally and more than 100 times cheaper to run than Anthropic's Claude Fable 5, according to a research firm. DeepSeek, which
[4]
Alibaba shares rally after unveiling its 'most powerful' AI model as U.S.-China competition heats up
Alibaba unveiled its latest and "most powerful" AI model Qwen3.8-Max on Monday as Chinese companies race to close the AI gap with the U.S. Qwen3.8-Max, which is scheduled for release next week, boasts 2.4 trillion parameters, making it one of the "most powerful" AI models in the Chinese tech
[5]
Alibaba unveils Qwen3.8-Max, its most capable model, closing on Moonshot in size
The 2.4-trillion-parameter model ranks top among Chinese text models and second worldwide on a visual benchmark, and launches next week. Alibaba has unveiled Qwen3.8-Max, the most capable model it has built and a pointed entry in the size race between China's largest AI developers. At 2.4 trillion
[6]
Alibaba unveils its most capable AI model to date, not far behind Moonshot's in size
BEIJING, Aug 3 (Reuters) - China's Alibaba (9988.HK), opens new tab on Monday unveiled what it said is its largest and most capable artificial-intelligence model, the Qwen3.8-Max, which is not far behind in size when compared with an offering from domestic rival Moonshot AI launched last
[7]
DeepSeek's V4-Flash is the cheapest well-known AI model to run, research firm finds
Artificial Analysis put the cost of running the model through its benchmark suite at about three cents, a fraction of what rivals charge. It now costs about three cents to push one of the world's better-known AI models through a full benchmark suite. That is the figure from Artificial Analysis,
[8]
Alibaba launches Qwen3.8-Max, its largest AI model yet
On coding, Alibaba said the model ran for more than 16 days in a fully autonomous operation, accumulating 265 commits, 127 pull requests, and 151 issues in a self-built software repository without human input. In a separate test, it entered a competition against 526 human teams, completing tasks
[9]
Alibaba Just Gave Away Its Best AI Model For Free, Almost Matching Claude and ChatGPT
Alibaba released Qwen3.8-Max on Monday, calling it the most capable model it has ever built. The weights land on Hugging Face and ModelScope next week -- the first time the company has given away a model at Max scale. The specs are big: 2.4 trillion parameters total, with 95 billion switched on at
[10]
Alibaba's new AI claims to match Claude, upping the US-China AI race
Alibaba's Qwen team says its newest model can design a computer chip and rewrite a research paper -- all without a human watching over it, matching skills its rival Anthropic already claims for Claude. Chinese tech giant Alibaba says its newest AI model can work alone, unsupervised, for days on
[11]
Alibaba unveils open-source Qwen3.8-Max AI model
Alibaba on Monday unveiled Qwen3.8-Max, its largest open-source artificial intelligence model, and said it would release the model's weights for public download next week. The model has 2.4 trillion parameters and Alibaba said its performance is competitive with leading models from OpenAI and
[12]
Qwen 3.8-Max: can Alibaba challenge OpenAI & Anthropic? | TechPulse
Alibaba has unveiled Qwen 3.8-Max, its largest AI model ever with 2.4 trillion parameters. But what do parameters actually mean, and does a bigger model automatically make it smarter?In this 60-second breakdown, we explain:What AI parameters areWhat tokens are and why they matterQwen's claimed
[13]
Qwen 3.8 Max Launches with a Massive 2.44 Trillion Parameters
Qwen 3.8 Max is the latest and largest open-weight multimodal AI model, featuring an impressive 2.44 trillion parameters. This advancement marks a new chapter in the Qwen series, emphasizing both scale and functionality. According to Prompt Engineering, one notable feature is Recursive
[14]
Qwen 3.8-Max launches with 2.4 trillion parameters. Don't trust the benchmarks just yet
Alibaba launched its large AI model Qwen3.8-Max with many parameters. This model supports extensive context windows and multimodal inputs for complex tasks. OpenAI also hinted at its next model, Astra, for advanced problem-solving. Both companies are focusing on autonomous AI workers, not just
[15]
Alibaba Launches Qwen 3.8 Max with a 1 Million Token Context
Alibaba's Qwen 3.8 Max has been released, featuring 2.4 trillion parameters and a focus on advanced tasks such as multimodal workflows and 3D simulation generation. The open-weight Qwen 3.8 27B model complements it by allowing developers to customize deployments locally, offering greater control
[16]
Alibaba AI model: Alibaba unveils its most capable AI model to date, not far behind Moonshot's in size
Chinese tech companies - a huge force in open-weight AI models globally - are locked in a fierce and fast-moving battle to build more powerful systems without making them prohibitively expensive to run. China's Alibaba on Monday unveiled what it said is its largest and most capable
[17]
Alibaba Launches Qwen3.8 Max to Challenge Anthropic AI
Alibaba has launched Qwen3.8 Max, its biggest AI model yet, with 2.4 trillion parameters. The Chinese tech giant announced the model on August 3 as China's AI race grows stronger. Alibaba says Qwen3.8 Max can match or beat Anthropic's Fable 5 on several tests. The model also ranks above Moonshot
[18]
Why is Alibaba stock surging today? By Investing.com
Investing.com -- Alibaba's Hong Kong stock surged 6.4% to HK$124.5 after the company released a new, advanced artificial intelligence model. The technology giant unveiled Qwen 3.8-MAX, the latest version of its flagship artificial intelligence model, which it said delivered improvements in
[19]
Alibaba unveils Qwen 3.8-MAX AI model; shares jump By Investing.com
Investing.com-- Alibaba Group (HK:9988) shares rose on Monday after the technology giant unveiled Qwen 3.8-MAX, the latest version of its flagship artificial intelligence model, as competition intensifies among Chinese firms racing to develop more powerful generative AI systems. Hong Kong-listed
[20]
Alibaba unveils its largest AI model yet, DeepSeek's latest model is ultra-low cost
BEIJING, Aug 3 (Reuters) - China's Alibaba on Monday unveiled its largest and most capable AI model to date, sending its shares surging, while a research firm said DeepSeek's latest product offers cut-throat pricing that is more than 100 times cheaper than Anthropic's Claude Fable 5. The two
[21]
Alibaba Releases New AI Model as Competition Intensifies
China's Alibaba Group released a new artificial-intelligence model as technology giants continue to race to build ever more capable systems. The Hangzhou-based company said the model, called Qwen 3.8-Max, is the "most powerful model in the Qwen series to date." The model boasts 2.4 trillion
[22]
What is Alibaba's Qwen 3.8-Max? How it is different from Claude Fable 5 and Kimi K3
Alibaba says Qwen 3.8-Max rivals Kimi K3 while positioning it just behind Anthropic's Claude Fable 5 in global AI benchmarks. Alibaba has introduced its latest Qwen 3.8-Max, the most advanced AI model till date. This new model directly rivals AI systems such as Anthropic's Claude Fable 5 and
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Alibaba released Qwen3.8-Max, its most powerful AI model yet, with 2.4 trillion parameters and performance matching Anthropic's Claude Fable 5. The open-weight release intensifies U.S.-China competition as Chinese firms rapidly close the gap with American AI leaders through aggressive releases and cost efficiency.
Alibaba Challenges AI Supremacy with Qwen3.8-Max Release
Alibaba unveiled Qwen3.8-Max on Monday, marking its largest and most capable AI model to date
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. The Chinese tech giant claims performance rivaling top systems from Anthropic and OpenAI, escalating U.S.-China competition in artificial intelligence1
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. With 2.4 trillion parameters, the model sits just below Moonshot AI's Kimi K3 at 2.8 trillion parameters, positioning it as a direct challenge to American AI dominance5
. Alibaba shares rallied 7% on the Hong Kong exchange following the announcement, reflecting investor confidence in the company's AI strategy4
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Source: Geeky Gadgets
Enterprise Software Engineering and Multimodal Reasoning Capabilities
Qwen3.8-Max employs a mixture-of-experts architecture that activates approximately 95 billion parameters during inference, balancing power with efficiency for enterprise software engineering and multimodal reasoning tasks
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. The model handles text, images, and video while supporting a context window of up to 1 million tokens, enough capacity to process large codebases, extended video transcripts, or substantial document collections simultaneously4
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. Alibaba reported the model completed a software-engineering project over a 16-day autonomous agent run, demonstrating capabilities for long-horizon tasks that businesses increasingly demand5
.Benchmark Performance Against Global Competition
Results from Alibaba's testing and crowdsourced rankings on Arena.AI suggest Qwen3.8-Max performs as advertised
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. On the Arena text model leaderboard, Qwen3.8-Max trails only Claude Fable 5 and three models in Anthropic's Opus family1
. For frontend coding, only two Claude Opus models and Kimi K3 surpass it, while in visual analysis, Qwen3.8-Max ranks second globally behind only Claude Fable 51
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. These rankings position it as the highest-performing Chinese text model on public benchmarks5
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Source: InfoWorld
Open-Weight Models Strategy Differentiates Chinese AI Industry
Alibaba will release the weights for Qwen3.8-Max next week through Alibaba Cloud's Model Studio, marking a return to open-weight releases after briefly pivoting toward proprietary models earlier this year
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. Open-weight models have become standard practice in China's AI industry, with Moonshot releasing Kimi K3's weights last week and many top Chinese models following suit1
. Beijing champions this strategy to expand China's influence in global AI governance and encourage widespread adoption of domestic technology1
. Chinese developers publish parameter counts and weights while OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google keep these figures private, creating a clear divide in industry approaches5
.Related Stories
Cost Efficiency Reshapes Competitive Landscape
The broader Chinese AI market races costs toward the floor, with DeepSeek's V4-Flash model charging $0.14 per million input tokens and $0.28 per million output tokens according to Artificial Analysis
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. This pricing proves more than 100 times cheaper than Anthropic's Claude Fable 5 at $3.15 per test, while OpenAI's GPT-5.6 Sol costs $1.86 per test3
. Though Alibaba has not published token pricing for Qwen3.8-Max, recent Chinese models have undercut Western rivals significantly5
. For enterprises weighing deployment efficiency alongside performance, these cost advantages matter as businesses seek cheaper ways to deploy AI at scale3
.Geopolitical Implications and Industry Tensions
The release intensifies U.S.-China competition as Chinese firms rapidly narrow the gap with American companies and accelerate their release tempo
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. Qwen3.8-Max follows closely after Kimi K3's release, while ByteDance and MiniMax released capable video generation models on Friday, demonstrating coordinated momentum across China's AI sector1
. Amid reports of potential crackdowns on open tools following Chinese releases, the U.S. industry has rallied around preserving access to open-weight models as both a safety necessity and means of preserving competition1
. Anthropic has accused Alibaba of running large-scale model distillation campaigns against Claude, attempting to copy the American model's behavior, though Alibaba disputes these charges5
. Recent cybersecurity incidents involving escaped AI agents from OpenAI and Anthropic have added complexity to debates about restrictive safety rails that may limit defensive capabilities1
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Source: The Verge
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