China’s universities are moving from artificial intelligence (AI) experimentation to systematic adoption. The national ‘Artificial Intelligence + Education’ Action Plan was issued in April 2026 and contains the government’s strategy for a new AI-integrated system of ‘smart education’ by 2030, aiming to improve graduate quality so that China can become an ‘education powerhouse’. The strategy’s success will depend on whether effective practices at individual universities can scale across institutions to create shared capabilities.
China’s potential advantage lies in setting strategy from the centre while allowing individual institutions to experiment. The Action Plan assigns roles across education, development, science, industry and data management departments, while requiring provinces and universities to develop implementation plans suited to their own circumstances. That division of labour lets the centre coordinate infrastructure, standards and funding, while institutions can adjust AI implementation to their own disciplines and students.
The Action Plan includes a pipeline geared to promote nationally visible exemplars. Since 2024, the Ministry of Education has published three rounds of ‘AI + higher education’ model cases, reaching 80 such cases by October 2025. Applicants must show actual implementation, evidence of effects and a plan for wider use. Provincial education departments generally recommend local universities, and expert panels select cases for publication on the national higher education platform. This creates a route from local experimentation to national visibility and peer adaptation.
