Chinese AI Models Dominate OpenRouter, Surpassing US Counterparts in Usage and Efficiency

In a landmark development for the global artificial intelligence landscape, Chinese-developed open-weight models have seized the top three spots on OpenRouter, the popular platform for comparing and deploying LLMs, according to user data aggregated from community forums and industry analysis. For the first time in the platform’s history, a single model — Qwen3.5-397B-A17B — surpassed 3 trillion tokens processed in a single week, while two other Chinese models crossed the trillion-token threshold, collectively outpacing even the most powerful U.S.-based proprietary systems like GPT-4 and Grok-4. This surge marks a decisive turning point in the open vs. closed model rivalry, suggesting that efficiency, open access, and targeted optimization are now outpacing scale alone.

According to Latent.Space’s weekly AI roundup, the Qwen3.5-397B-A17B model, developed by Alibaba’s Tongyi Lab, is being hailed as the "smallest Open-Opus class" model yet, achieving near-top-tier performance with a fraction of the computational overhead of its competitors. The model’s architecture leverages advanced distillation techniques and sparse activation patterns, allowing it to deliver high-quality reasoning and multilingual capabilities while maintaining low inference costs. This has made it a favorite among developers, researchers, and startups seeking cost-effective, scalable AI without licensing restrictions.

The rise of Chinese models on OpenRouter reflects a broader trend identified by AI analyst Nathan Lambert in his Substack analysis, "Open Models in Perpetual Catch-Up." Lambert notes that while U.S. companies have historically dominated headlines with billion-parameter behemoths, open models from China have been quietly refining their approach — prioritizing real-world utility, inference speed, and community feedback loops. "The open models aren’t trying to out-scale ClosedAI anymore," Lambert writes. "They’re out-engineering them."

OpenRouter’s usage metrics, which track token volume across thousands of deployed models, show a dramatic shift in user behavior. Where U.S. models once commanded over 70% of traffic, Chinese open models now account for more than 65% of weekly token processing. This is not merely a matter of volume — it’s a sign of adoption. Developers are migrating away from expensive, closed APIs toward open-weight alternatives that can be self-hosted, fine-tuned, and audited.

The implications extend beyond commercial platforms. Academic institutions and emerging AI hubs in Southeast Asia and Eastern Europe are increasingly adopting Qwen-series models as their foundation for local language processing, education, and public service applications. The model’s strong performance in Mandarin, Cantonese, and other regional languages — combined with its ability to handle code, math, and logical reasoning — has made it a de facto standard in non-English AI ecosystems.

While U.S. tech giants continue to invest billions in proprietary architectures, the open-source community is demonstrating that innovation doesn’t require secrecy. As Lambert observes, "The closed models are racing to keep up with a moving target — one that’s being built by thousands of contributors across GitHub, Hugging Face, and Discord servers, not just corporate labs."

Analysts caution that regulatory and geopolitical tensions may complicate the global adoption of Chinese models, particularly in Western markets. However, the technical superiority and economic efficiency of models like Qwen3.5-397B-A17B suggest that the open model movement is no longer a niche alternative — it’s becoming the new baseline for AI innovation.

The Qwen team has not yet issued a public statement on the OpenRouter milestone, but internal benchmarks shared with select researchers indicate plans to release a 1.2T-parameter variant by Q3 2026, further narrowing the gap with closed systems. For now, the message from the AI community is clear: the future of large language models isn’t just open — it’s Chinese-built, and it’s here to stay.