Tencent is stepping up its push into AI-driven social experiences.
On January 26, Tencent quietly started inside testing of a brand new model of its AI assistant Yuanbao, granting chosen customers entry to a brand new characteristic known as “Yuanbao Occasion.” In accordance with sources throughout the firm, Yuanbao Occasion represents Tencent’s newest experiment in social interplay constructed round AI.
Customers can create or be a part of a “Occasion,” a shared social house the place they will check out new interactive options reminiscent of “Ask Yuanbao,” display sharing, watching motion pictures collectively, and listening to music collectively. These options are anticipated to roll out steadily via phased testing.
In contrast to conventional chatbots that target one-on-one conversations, Tencent positions Yuanbao Occasion as a multi-user social house. Inside this setting, AI can actively take part in group chats, assist set the temper, and execute duties. Yuanbao may also perform as a sensible assistant for shared or household areas, permitting customers to set reminders, manage group challenges reminiscent of studying or health check-ins, and coordinate actions. The characteristic additionally leverages Tencent Assembly’s underlying audio and video infrastructure, enabling synchronized media experiences amongst associates.
Notably, Yuanbao Occasion is built-in with Tencent’s broader social ecosystem. Customers can share a Occasion ID or invitation hyperlink instantly by way of WeChat Moments, WeChat chats, or QQ, permitting associates to hitch with a single faucet.
Why Social AI?
Tencent Yuanbao has seen a flurry of exercise not too long ago. On January 25—the identical day Yuanbao Occasion entered testing—Tencent introduced a Lunar New 12 months marketing campaign launching on February 1, throughout which it is going to distribute as much as RMB 1 billion (roughly USD 139 million) in money purple packets. The marketing campaign connects Yuanbao with WeChat, QQ, and different Tencent merchandise, aiming to spice up engagement via holiday-driven social incentives.
Tencent had largely stayed out of Huge Tech’s Lunar New 12 months purple packet wars in recent times. By combining AI options with social and festive mechanics, the corporate is now attempting to deliver the AI battle into the social area—its conventional stronghold.
Trade-wide, many consider chatbots usually are not the ultimate type of AI purposes. Whereas some see the long run in reasoning and activity execution, and others in embodied AI reminiscent of robotics and autonomous driving, Chinese language AI firms have largely centered on Brokers—AI techniques that carry out duties like ordering meals or planning journeys. Nevertheless, this method has struggled to meaningfully enhance consumer retention.
Yuanbao Occasion represents another path. By embedding AI into social relationships, Tencent goals to deepen engagement. In Tencent’s imaginative and prescient, AI acts each as a social facilitator and an effectivity instrument—taking part in conversations, summarizing discussions, organizing paperwork, scheduling conferences, and even planning journeys.
Tencent has been steadily exploring AI-social integration, from AI summaries in QQ group chats to WeChat contact integration, and now to a standalone AI-native social house. Including social layers considerably will increase stickiness whereas offering richer context for Brokers—however success will rely on discovering a breakout use case.
Tencent has precedent right here. In 2014, WeChat purple packets efficiently moved offline social customs on-line, serving to WeChat Pay rise to dominance. In early 2025, Yuanbao’s speedy integration with DeepSeek helped safe its place amongst China’s prime three AI-native apps. Testing Yuanbao Occasion forward of this yr’s Lunar New 12 months marks one other main guess.
Tencent Accelerates Its AI Push
Past social experimentation, Tencent has ramped up AI efforts within the second half of 2025, from multimodal mannequin growth to expertise recruitment and organizational restructuring.
A key determine on this shift is Yao Shunyu, a 27-year-old former OpenAI researcher. In accordance with insiders, his arrival has introduced contemporary considering round mannequin growth and attracted broader AI expertise curiosity in Tencent.
Below his management, Tencent reorganized its large-model groups, establishing an AI Infra unit centered on distributed coaching and high-performance inference, alongside an AI Knowledge unit liable for information pipelines and analysis techniques. Tencent’s mannequin technique has turn out to be extra centered, combining stronger infrastructure, higher-quality information, up to date pretraining, and strengthened studying approaches.
Nonetheless, challenges stay. AI accuracy and activity execution reliability usually are not but mature sufficient for aggressive deployment inside core platforms like WeChat. That warning explains why Tencent is experimenting with AI social options in Yuanbao—a standalone AI-native app with an present consumer base—quite than instantly inside WeChat group chats.
Sources accustomed to Tencent’s mannequin crew advised Jiemian Information that Hunyuan has already launched an Agent-oriented mannequin internally, supporting exploration throughout enterprise items. In collaboration with Yuanbao, Hunyuan will present deeply custom-made fashions to allow extra personalised experiences.
For Tencent, this will likely solely be the start.
Supply: Jiemian Information
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