Apple Intelligence, the set of AI features Apple has been rolling out on its phones and computers since 2024, finally has regulatory clearance in China. The approval came from China's Cyberspace Administration, the government body that reviews and approves any AI service before it reaches Chinese users. The approved version will run on Alibaba's AI model, Qwen, which will handle text and image tasks from within Apple's own interface.
To understand why this took so long, you need to know how China regulates AI. Any company, foreign or domestic, must get government sign-off before offering AI features to the public in the country. Approval is not automatic, and the process typically takes months, sometimes over a year. OpenAI's ChatGPT, which powers Apple Intelligence outside China, is not approved there at all. Apple had to find a local partner whose model was already cleared, negotiate the integration, then seek approval for the combined product.
The search took longer than expected. Apple reportedly explored deals with Baidu, DeepSeek, and ByteDance's AI models before settling on Alibaba's Qwen. Baidu is also now confirmed to have some role in the final product, though what it covers specifically is still unclear.
Qwen is Alibaba's family of AI models. It handles text, images, audio, and video, and supports over 100 languages. The latest versions are competitive with Western AI models on most standard tasks. Alibaba has made many of its Qwen models freely available for anyone to download and modify, which has made Qwen one of the most widely used AI model families in the world outside of direct consumer products.
The timing is good for Apple in China. iPhone shipments there jumped 28% in the final quarter of 2025, giving Apple a 22% market share, the highest it had reached since 2022. Apple achieved all of this without any AI features available to Chinese users. The local rivals it competes with, Huawei in particular, have had AI capabilities on their devices throughout this period. Adding AI features now means Apple can close that gap.
For Alibaba, this deal is a signal to investors that Qwen has global reach. Alibaba's US-listed shares rose over 6% on the day the deal was announced. The partnership also gives Qwen its most visible international deployment: hundreds of millions of Apple devices in China running Alibaba's AI.
Neither Apple nor Alibaba gave a launch date. Regulatory approval is a prerequisite for launch, not a launch itself. The actual rollout will depend on how Apple bundles the features into its next software update cycle for China.
One broader pattern worth noting: China's AI approval process is a preview of how other large markets may evolve. The European Union is building its own AI regulation regime, and several other governments are watching how China's model plays out before writing their own rules. Any company planning to offer AI-powered services at scale in multiple countries will face some version of this: local rules, local partners, and local approval timelines built into the product roadmap. Apple's two-year wait to reach Chinese users is a concrete cost of that reality.