BEIJING: On a summer day, cheers erupted as clusters of children watched robots race across a soccer pitch, battling it out in playful matches, at a science center in Jiaxing, east China’s Zhejiang Province.
At a nearby workbench, nine-year-old Zhang Qihang was busy assembling a robot of his own. “Building robots is awesome! I can let my imagination run wild,” he said, beaming with excitement.
This was the scene at an artificial intelligence (AI) summer camp — part of a new wave of study tours gaining traction across China. Moving beyond textbooks, students are flocking to tech giants, university labs and science centers, eager to get hands-on experience with cutting-edge AI technologies and see firsthand how the future is taking shape.
During this summer vacation, AI-themed study tours have begun to gain ground, with bookings surging 370 percent year on year, according to online travel platform Ctrip.
To tap into the growing demand for AI-focused tech tourism, a travel agency based in Nanjing, east China’s Jiangsu Province, began adding visits to technology companies to its trip programs last summer. “On our Shanghai-Hangzhou independent study tours, AI-related activities now account for more than 80 percent of the itinerary,” founder Zhu Ping said.
The boom is unfolding against the backdrop of China’s broader AI boom, powered by a wave of homegrown models and applications. For a growing number of Chinese teenagers, AI tools such as DeepSeek, Kimi and Doubao are becoming familiar companions in their everyday lives.
The number of AI enterprises in China had surpassed 6,000 last year, and the output value of the core AI industry was projected to exceed 1.2 trillion yuan (about 177 billion U.S. dollars) during the same period, representing a year-on-year increase of nearly 30 percent.
Moreover, China was home to more than 140 humanoid robot developers in 2025, with shipments reaching 14,400 units — accounting for 84.7 percent of the global market, according to an industry research report.
To help children prepare for an AI-driven future, China unveiled an “AI Plus Education” initiative earlier this year, encouraging schools to take AI learning beyond the classroom through after-school programs and hands-on activities. The goal is to help students understand and use AI properly, while sparking curiosity, nurturing creativity and honing their critical-thinking and problem-solving skills.
Today, the AI study-tour wave is sweeping through China’s schools, as primary and secondary schools incorporate it into their educational programs. Parents are taking their children into the heart of the tech industry to see how AI transforms the real world.
China’s tech-tourism boom is also drawing international visitors keen to get a close-up look at the innovation behind “Made in China.”
Since opening in Shanghai in May, Unitree Robotics’s first embodied intelligence experience store in Asia has attracted many foreign visitors.
Victoria, from Denmark, visited the store last month. “I’ve seen some of the dancing videos, but it’s really cool to see them in real life,” she said, viewing the development of AI and robotics in China as “revolutionary, new and exciting.” –The Daily Mail-Global Times news exchange item
