Updated by Faith Barbara N Ruhinda at 1028 EAT on Wednesday 19 November 2025.

China’s public shows significantly higher confidence in artificial intelligence than people in the United States and other Western nations, according to a new survey.

Eighty-seven percent of respondents in China said they trust AI, compared with 67 percent in Brazil, 32 percent in the United States, 36 percent in the United Kingdom, and 39 percent in Germany, the Edelman poll released on Tuesday found.

More than seven in 10 respondents in China said they expect AI to help address a range of societal challenges — from climate change and mental illness to poverty and political polarisation.

In the United States, only one-third of respondents said they believed AI would reduce poverty and polarisation, though half anticipated a positive impact on climate-related issues.

The survey also found a stark divide in public enthusiasm for wider AI adoption: 54 percent of Chinese respondents said they welcomed greater use of the technology, compared with just 17 percent of Americans.

Trust was highest among younger adults, though Western levels remained far lower. Eighty-eight percent of Chinese aged 18–34 said they had confidence in AI, compared with 40 percent of Americans in the same age group.

“For businesses and policymakers, this divergence presents a double challenge,” Edelman senior vice president Gray Grossman said in a report accompanying the findings. “In high-trust markets, the task is to sustain optimism through responsible deployment and clear evidence of benefit. In low-trust markets, the task is to rebuild confidence in the institutions behind the technology.”

The results come as the United States and China remain locked in a race for technological dominance, with companies in both countries rolling out increasingly advanced AI models.

While the United States is still widely viewed as holding an edge in developing the most advanced AI systems, Chinese firms such as Alibaba and DeepSeek have made significant gains in recent months with “open” language models that promise far lower costs for customers.

Last month, Airbnb chief executive Brian Chesky drew attention when he disclosed that the short-term rental platform preferred Alibaba’s Qwen model over OpenAI’s ChatGPT.

“It’s very good. It’s also fast and cheap,” Chesky told Bloomberg in an interview.

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