Chinese regulators have approved Apple’s rollout of Apple Intelligence in China, South China Morning Post reporter Ben Jiang reported from Beijing. The license gives Apple a path to offer its AI features on iPhones in a market where foreign AI services need local regulatory clearance and local technical partners.
The Cyberspace Administration of China, the country’s internet regulator, published a notice Wednesday confirming the approval, according to the South China Morning Post. The license covers Apple Intelligence, Apple’s set of features for tasks such as summarizing email, drafting reports and editing images.
The approval was not granted to Apple alone. Jiang reported that the CAC cleared six other smartphone-based AI services at the same time, including services tied to Samsung and Huawei Technologies.
Alibaba and Baidu are the local AI partners
Alibaba Group Holding and Baidu are working with Apple on the China version of Apple Intelligence, according to representatives from both companies cited by the South China Morning Post.
An Alibaba representative told the newspaper that Alibaba’s Qwen large language model will be integrated into Apple Intelligence experiences for users in China across iOS, iPadOS, macOS and visionOS. The representative said that integration would let users access Qwen capabilities including text and image generation. The South China Morning Post also disclosed that Alibaba owns the newspaper.
A Baidu representative told the South China Morning Post that Baidu is also working with Apple to develop AI features for Apple Intelligence in China. The report did not detail which Baidu models or features will be used.
The mechanism here is straightforward, at least at the level the companies have described: Apple’s user-facing AI features can remain inside Apple’s operating systems, while model work for users in China is handled with approved Chinese partners. That lets Apple present the feature as Apple Intelligence while relying on models that have cleared China’s regulatory process.
What the approval does and does not establish
The approval concerns Apple Intelligence, the AI feature set Apple announced two years ago and began rolling out with iOS 18, according to Daring Fireball. That is separate from the Siri AI work Apple announced last month at WWDC for iOS 27.
Daring Fireball noted that current coverage has not made clear whether the CAC approval also gives Apple clearance to launch that newer Siri AI work in China this year. The confirmed point is narrower: Apple Intelligence has received a license, and Apple’s China deployment will use AI models from Alibaba and Baidu.
For users in China, the practical effect is that Apple’s previously unavailable AI tools can move toward launch on Apple devices with local model support. For Apple, the approval removes a regulatory blocker for one of its major software features in a country where the company cannot assume that a global AI rollout will be accepted as-is.
This story draws on original reporting from Daring Fireball.