Tencent tests AI assistant Xiaowei in WeChat as it races to catch up with ByteDance and Alibaba

Tencent tests AI assistant in China's most popular app as it looks to catch up with rivals

Tencent on Monday said it is testing an AI assistant within WeChat in China as the tech giant looks to step up efforts to challenge rivals in the country's competitive artificial intelligence market. Xiaowei, "a native AI assistant," is being tested "on a small scale" in Weixin, the Chinese version of WeChat, Tencent said in a statement translated by CNBC. Users can interact with Xiaowei with text or voice, communicate with friends and launch "mini-programs," Tencent added. Mini-programs are apps that run inside of WeChat. Tencent executives have been mulling further integration of AI into WeChat since last year, with investors watching closely to see if this can be a new revenue stream and a way to monetize AI.

WeChat begins testing Xiaowei as Tencent eyes a Q3 AI rollout

Xiaowei sits on top of the super app's mini-programs, and Tencent is aiming for a full public rollout in the third quarter. WeChat is the rare app that already does almost everything. Chinese users message, pay, book, shop, and summon a taxi without ever leaving it, which is exactly what makes Tencent's next move interesting: rather than build a separate chatbot and fight for downloads, it is putting an AI assistant on top of the app a billion people already open every day. Tencent has begun testing that assistant, named Xiaowei, with a small group of users. According to a statement from WeChat, the tool lets people interact by text or voice and complete tasks by tapping into the app's vast library of mini-programs, the lightweight apps that run inside WeChat. In practice Xiaowei is meant to be a command layer: ask it to start a call, draft a message, or navigate to a service, and it does the menu-digging for you. It draws mainly on Weixin's own large language model, turning to DeepSeek for some queries. The test is a limited one, and Tencent has framed it as a step toward a fuller launch. The company is targeting a public rollout in the third quarter, with the longer ambition of turning WeChat into something closer to a concierge that can handle payments, services, and financial tasks on a spoken or typed instruction. Investors liked the sound of it. Tencent shares jumped on expectations of an AI agent living inside the super app. Xiaowei is not Tencent's first attempt to fold AI into WeChat. Earlier this year it added Yuanbao, a standalone chatbot users could befriend like a contact and message directly. Xiaowei is the more ambitious idea: not a bot you talk to, but a layer that acts across the app on your behalf. It is the difference between asking an assistant a question and asking it to get something done. The strategy is one we have watched take shape across China's biggest platforms, from AI shopping agents at Alibaba and Meituan to Tencent's own enterprise agent platform. The common bet is that the agent will be a feature of an app people already use, not a destination they have to be talked into visiting. Few companies are better placed to test that than the one that owns WeChat. The reach is the whole argument. WeChat has roughly 1.4 billion users, an audience most AI firms can only envy, and embedding the assistant rather than launching it separately lets Tencent skip the most expensive part of the business, which is persuading anyone to show up. Whether those users want an agent acting on their behalf, and whether Tencent's models are reliable enough to be trusted with payments and personal tasks, is what the coming quarter's test is for.

Tencent tests new AI agent Xiaowei on WeChat

Known as 'Weixin' in China, WeChat has rolled out the AI agent on a phased basis. Tencent is testing a new AI assistant on its messaging platform WeChat, as the company attempts to catch up with its Chinese and global contemporaries. WeChat is China's most popular messaging platform with roughly 1.4bn users. Known as 'Weixin' in China, WeChat has rolled out the agent on a phased basis. Users can interact with the AI agent, called 'Xiaowei', via text or voice, and complete tasks by tapping into mini apps. The agent assists with a wide range of tasks, including changing settings, sending messages, ordering food, hailing rides and generating images. Xiaowei uses WeChat's own large language model WeLM, while also tapping into DeepSeek to process some queries. Tencent is closely associated with DeepSeek, which reportedly led the recent $7.4bn round into the AI start-up. The company was also reported to have proposed taking a 20pc stake in the start-up. While, The Information reported last week that Tencent was preparing to purchase Manus back from Meta after China blocked the $2bn acquisition. HSG and ZhenFund are also reportedly looking to buy back Manus using fresh capital. Despite holding stakes in leading AI companies in the country, the WeChat-owner trails behind its peers ByteDance and Alibaba over adoption and advances in AI technology. Alibaba has integrated travel, maps and e-commerce services into its Qwen AI app, while ByteDance has added agentic functions into its app called Doubao. The Financial Times reported on Tencent's plans to launch the embedded AI agent earlier this month, with added pressure from its well-performing contemporaries. The publication reported that the company made the AI agent roll-out its highest strategic priority, while internal estimates suggest that a full roll out of Xiaowei will be very costly for the company. Tencent itself already has an embedded chatbot in WeChat called Yuanbao. Don't miss out on the knowledge you need to succeed. Sign up for the Daily Brief, Silicon Republic's digest of need-to-know sci-tech news.

Tencent tests AI assistant for its super app WeChat in China

Known as Weixin in China, the super app has made the new AI assistant available to a small number of users, according to a statement from WeChat on Monday. Users are able to interact with the service, named Xiaowei, via text or voice, and the tool can help them complete various tasks by tapping into mini-apps, WeChat added. Tencent Holdings Ltd. has started testing a new AI assistant for WeChat as part of its efforts to catch up with peers in China's white-hot artificial intelligence race. Known as Weixin in China, the super app has made the new AI assistant available to a small number of users, according to a statement from WeChat on Monday. Users are able to interact with the service, named Xiaowei, via text or voice, and the tool can help them complete various tasks by tapping into mini-apps, WeChat added. While WeChat didn't specify what tasks the agent-like Xiaowei can accomplish, the super app hosts food delivery and ride-hailing mini-programs. Xiaowei mainly uses Weixin's own large language model WeLM while sometimes turning to DeepSeek to process some queries, Tencent's customer service unit said in a separate statement. A successful introduction of enhanced AI services in WeChat, China's most popular messaging service with over a billion users, may now be essential in helping Tencent better compete with other major Chinese players and monetize new technology. The Shenzhen-based company trails peers like ByteDance Ltd. and Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. in terms of both user adoption and advances in developing state-of-the-art large language models. Chinese tech companies are gradually integrating more powerful AI technology to their super apps to keep users on their platforms. Alibaba's fintech affiliate Ant Group Co. is testing an AI agent within its Alipay app that will allow users to book car rides or order takeouts.