Alibaba Group Holding 's revamped artificial intelligence (AI) The assistant application called Quark, known for its intuitive design, exceeded ByteDance’s Douyin to claim the title of China's top AI app in March, highlighting its popularity with domestic users.
Quark At the forefront of Chinese AI applications is one ranked first, boasting almost 150 million monthly active users globally, with ByteDance trailing behind. Doubao and DeepSeek , with approximately 100 million and about 77 million users each, as reported by Aicpb.com, a website monitoring the popularity of AI solutions.
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The site compiles information from Apple’s and Google’s global application stores along with various Chinese Android marketplaces; however, it does not include traffic directly accessing the chatbot sites. Previously, Alibaba mentioned that Quark, which offers versions for both mobile devices and computers, boasted an overall user base of 200 million individuals without breaking down these figures per specific platform.
A distinct report published by the American venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz in early March positioned Quark as the sixth most widely used artificial intelligence application worldwide based on monthly active users. This ranking placed Quark right after Baidu’s AI Search and lagged behind both OpenAI's ChatGPT and Microsoft's AI-boosted Edge browser.
Quark’s quick rise coincides with Alibaba's transformation of the app from merely a cloud storage and search tool into an “AI super assistant.” Last month, Alibaba introduced the updated version of Quark, which now utilizes the company’s Qwen reasoning models—AI systems engineered to ponder responses before delivering answers, thus adept at handling intricate assignments.
The application includes an easy-to-use search field. Alibaba mentioned that it might assist with activities like academic research, document creation, image production, presentation building, medical diagnosis, trip planning, as well as generating texts and images and writing code.
The extensive array of AI functionalities offered by Quark mirrors a larger pattern seen across Chinese technology companies, which are upgrading their chatbots with various features. This evolution aims to turn these platforms into what are known as AI super apps, helping them draw more users in an increasingly competitive marketplace.
To emulate the achievements of its leading application, Douyin—which is essentially China’s version of TikTok—ByteDance has rapidly expanded the functionalities of another platform called Doubao. This app now boasts web-searching abilities along with generating text, images, and even coding content. Reports suggest that ByteDance is currently exploring video creation potential within the Doubao environment as well.
In the meantime, Tencent Holdings has upgraded its Yuanbao chatbot by adding a gallery that showcases different AI agents—programs designed to carry out tasks independently for users or systems. Additionally, they have made improvements. integrated Yuanbao into WeChat , one of the most widely used apps in China.
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This article originally appeared on the South China Morning Post (www.scmp.com), the leading news media reporting on China and Asia.
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