(Yicai) March 4 -- The number of active artificial intelligence agents deployed by Chinese enterprises will grow at a compound annual rate of more than 135 percent over the next five years, outpacing major global markets, according to a report released today by International Data Corporation.

At that pace, the total number of enterprise AI agents in China is projected to exceed 350 million by 2031, marking an unprecedented phase of accelerated expansion as local foundation models improve and the application ecosystem matures. Token consumption is also expected to surge exponentially, rising by more than 30 times per year as task density and complexity increase.

IDC noted that domestic foundation models have made continuous breakthroughs over the past two years in core capabilities such as reasoning, tool use, coding, and long-text processing, providing a solid technical base for enterprise adoption. Chinese-developed models also offer performance and cost advantages, creating favorable conditions for large-scale deployment in business scenarios.

Looking ahead, IDC said policy support and ecosystem development will further accelerate adoption. Under China’s AI Plus action plan, released by the State Council in August last year, AI agent application penetration is expected to exceed 70 percent by 2027 and surpass 90 percent by 2030.

The maturity of the application ecosystem is another critical factor for large-scale implementation, the report said. Standardized protocols such as Model Context Protocol and Skills lower barriers for AI agents to integrate with systems and tools, broadening the scope of tasks they can perform.

In addition, AI agents built on low-code and no-code platforms are forecast to become mainstream in China, driven by widespread education through open-source platforms and free products. IDC estimates their number will jump from three million this year to 200 million in 2031. Unlike traditional coding tools, low-code and no-code platforms enable application development through visual interfaces and drag-and-drop functions, lowering technical thresholds and supporting diverse use cases.

The outburst of AI agents will open up a rare strategic opportunity period for enterprises, and those that take the lead in deploying AI Agents will benefit simultaneously in three aspects: efficiency improvement, cost optimization, and business innovation, said Sun Zhenya, China research manager at IDC.

Enterprises should complete the process of building their capabilities from the verification of the AI agents' scenarios to large-scale operations as soon as possible, and be well-prepared in terms of architecture upgrades, governance systems, and cost control, Sun added.

Editor: Emmi Laine