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He Huifeng

Zhang Qi, a ride-hailing driver based in Guangzhou, has turned to artificial intelligence this year to help his son make one of the most important decisions of his young life: choosing a university degree programme.
Like millions of 18-year-olds across China, Zhang’s son recently received his university entrance exam results and had to navigate the country’s labyrinthine admissions system – choosing from thousands of programmes at hundreds of schools.
Many middle-class families hire expensive “education consultants” to help their children pick a programme, but Zhang does not have that kind of money. Instead, he turned several Chinese AI chatbots into a “new free adviser”, he said.
The bots are not as good as a human consultant, but they have still proved hugely helpful, according to Zhang. They might even allow his son – who grew up in the family hometown in northern China’s Shanxi province – to realise his dream of studying in Shenzhen, one of China’s top innovation hubs.
“Before, we only knew about universities near home,” Zhang said. “Now, AI shows us which universities and majors our son’s score can get him into across the country. We’re busy making a living and can’t help our child much.”
Zhang is far from alone. AI has become a major factor in this year’s university admissions process in China, with millions of families turning to chatbots for advice on the best universities and degree programmes available.
For working-class families like Zhang’s, the platforms offer the tantalising prospect of levelling the playing field against the middle class, who are known in China for using every tool available – from consultants to family and professional connections – to give their child an edge in the educational rat race.
The summer is always a frenetic period for families with 18-year-old children in China. Unlike in other countries, the country’s university admissions system is determined almost entirely by exam results – a process designed to give even the poorest children the chance to ace their way into the country’s elite schools.


In June, 12.9 million candidates sat a set of standardised university entrance exams known as the gaokao. When the results came out later that month, it sparked a nationwide scramble as the candidates had just a few days to decide which major they wanted to enrol on before the admissions window closed.
In China, where a degree from a top university holds enormous prestige, the choice has the potential to be life-defining. The reputation of not only a university, but also the individual degree programmes they offer, may have a significant impact on a student’s future job prospects.
This year, many have turned to AI for guidance. More than 14 million users tried out the university admissions agent on Alibaba Group Holding’s Qwen AI assistant as of late June, according to the company.
Baidu reported in late June that about 15 million students had used its AI university application assistant, while Tencent Holdings announced around the same time that its Yuanbao chatbot had answered nearly 80 million admissions-related queries. Alibaba owns the South China Morning Post.
The trend has the potential to disrupt China’s lucrative university admissions consulting market, which was worth just over 1 billion yuan (US$147 million) in 2025 and is projected to grow to 1.22 billion yuan by 2027, according to a recent report by iiMedia Research. The report did not compare growth rates before and after the rise of AI admissions agents.
The consulting market has long been a source of inequality in China’s university system. According to iiMedia, parents and students mostly asked consultants for advice on the future employment prospects for graduates of different programmes, living costs for university students, and the pros and cons of studying in certain cities.
Until recently, working-class families like Zhang’s typically had to rely on schoolteachers, family networks or top influencers like Zhang Xuefeng – who died earlier this year – for tips on the best universities to pick. The AI agents promise to give them access to a huge volume of information they otherwise would have struggled to access.
You need to understand China’s job market and how society works before you know what to ask AI
Zhang Qi, Guangzhou-based father
But traditional consultants believe they can adapt to the rise of AI. Wu Rui, a consultant from Guangzhou, said AI was putting pressure on basic consulting services, but increasing demand for the personalised advice offered by humans.
Wu cut his prices this admissions season due to the growing popularity of AI admissions agents, offering his standard consultation package for 2,999 yuan instead of nearly 5,000 yuan.
He said his business had been affected this year, but demand remained resilient as many families were now seeking human advisers to help them interpret the recommendations given to them by AI chatbots.
Meanwhile, AI is not helping every family equally. Users who know how to write detailed AI prompts and judge the answers are likely to get better results than those who just enter their child’s exam scores, Wu said.
Zhang has learned this lesson first-hand. At first, he simply keyed in his son’s exam results, home province and preferred destinations, but found the AI’s recommendations to be too general.
After doing some research on social media, he started adding longer prompts that included extra details like his family’s tuition budget and whether his son hoped to become a civil servant or join the military. He is also careful to cross-check its answers with teachers and relatives.
“You need to understand China’s job market and how society works before you know what to ask AI,” Zhang said.


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This summer, millions of families turned to AI for advice on selecting a degree programme – a role once played by teachers, relatives and consultants


This summer, millions of families turned to AI for advice on selecting a degree programme – a role once played by teachers, relatives and consultants.


In China, parents turn to AI to help children select a university degree

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}This summer, millions of families turned to AI for advice on selecting a degree programme – a role once played by teachers, relatives and consultants

This summer, millions of families turned to AI for advice on selecting a degree programme – a role once played by teachers, relatives and consultants