Tencent's WeChat New AI Feature Rolls Out on Xiaomi, Huawei, and Oppo

Tencent, the Chinese tech giant behind WeChat, China's dominant messaging and payments app with 1.4 billion monthly users, confirmed today that selected users on Huawei, Honor, Xiaomi, Oppo, and Vivo devices can now control WeChat through their phone's built-in AI voice assistant.

Honor, the phone brand spun off from Huawei, is the first manufacturer to have completed the integration and pushed it to users. According to Caixin Global, half of Honor's active devices already support the feature, including the Magic8, 500, and X70 series.

Rollouts for Huawei, Xiaomi, Oppo, and Vivo are ongoing. For now, only calls and messages are supported. Payments and browsing WeChat's social feed are not yet available through voice assistants.

Xiaomi 17 Max vs Xiaomi 17 Pro MaxWhich Xiaomi flagship is actually worth it?TechloyLouis Eriakha

Why Tencent's WeChat AI approach is different from what ByteDance tried

In December 2025, ByteDance, the company behind TikTok, and phone maker ZTE launched an AI assistant called Doubao on the Nubia M153 handset. Doubao could control apps across the phone by voice, including WeChat, by simulating human screen taps using device-level permissions.

WeChat's security systems flagged this as unauthorised automated activity, and users started receiving forced logouts with error messages citing an abnormal login environment. ByteDance disabled the WeChat features within days.

Tencent's version requires both the user and WeChat to approve any action before the phone assistant can do anything inside the app. The phone sends an encrypted instruction to WeChat, WeChat executes it internally, and neither side can act without the other's sign-off. Tencent calls this a "dual authorization mechanism."

What moved Tencent stock 10% this week

On June 2, Tencent shares in Hong Kong rose 10.46%, closing at HK$481.60 and adding roughly $53 billion to the company's market value in a single session, the biggest one-day gain since late 2022.

The move came after Financial Times reported Tencent is building a broader AI assistant that would let users navigate WeChat's mini-programs by voice. WeChat mini-programs are small built-in tools inside the app for ordering food, booking taxis, and paying bills. That product remains in internal testing with no confirmed launch date, according to Caixin.

Tencent's stock had dropped more than 20% since the start of 2026 as investors questioned whether it was keeping pace with rivals Alibaba and ByteDance on AI. The June 2 stock surge and today's voice assistant confirmation are the first signs this week that those concerns are being answered with actual products.

WWDC 2026: How to Watch and What to Expect From Siri, iOS 27, and Apple AICan Apple finally deliver the Siri upgrade it promised two years ago?TechloyOgbonda Chivumnovu