Spring Festival Gala Centers High-Tech Again
Executive Summary:
- The content of the annual Spring Festival Gala broadcast is useful for gauging the priorities of the ruling Chinese Communist Party for the upcoming year.
- Technological developments in artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics featured prominently in this year’s program, with performances by humanoid robots and comedic sketches that touted technology as a potential solution to the PRC’s social and demographic issues.
- Military parades, typically a part of the show, received less attention this year, potentially signaling the Party’s desire to focus on issues such as innovation and promoting domestic consumption levels.
Every year, hundreds of millions of Chinese families gather together to celebrate the Lunar New Year. For many, an obligatory part of the festivities is the Spring Festival Gala (春晚), hosted and broadcast by China Media Group, the main state media corporation in the People’s Republic of China (PRC). This year’s spectacle lasted over four hours, featuring 49 segments of singing, dancing, comedic sketches, and other performances (Xinhua, February 16). The gala is a carefully planned and choreographed event. In addition to its entertainment value, it is engineered to highlight the government’s accomplishments in the past year and share the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) priorities with the country’s 1.4 billion citizens, as well as the millions of Chinese people overseas.
Technology was the main theme this year. This comes as no surprise, as central government policy over the past 12 months has emphasized technological development and the adoption and diffusion of artificial intelligence (AI) across the country (China Brief, September 21, 2025, November 3, 2025).
High-Tech Takes Center-Stage
AI adoption and diffusion was evident throughout the program. It even found its way into comedy sketches. Combining short sketches (小品) and crosstalk (相声), one segment made fun of a young couple for being excessively glued to their phones and highlighted how AI algorithms could influence their relationship. Beyond comedy, AI was advertised extensively throughout the show to the hundreds of millions of live viewers. Doubao (豆包), ByteDance’s (字节跳动) AI assistant, was the “AI partner” of the evening, and “assisted” the announcers in between performances. When they downloaded the application onto their smartphones, viewers at home were offered raffle prizes such as robots made by top robotics firm Unitree and drones made by flagship drone manufacturer DJI (South China Morning Post, February 11). Doubao reported over 1.9 billion user interactions during the broadcast—an order of magnitude more than the number of viewers for commercials advertising U.S. AI companies during the Superbowl the previous week (Caixin, February 18).
The year 2025 was the first in which the central government’s work plan included a reference to embodied AI. State media explicitly linked this prominence to humanoid robotics performances during this year’s gala, which were framed as a “window [on]to China’s industr[ial] policies” (CGTN, February 17). This was not the first robotics performance at a Lunar New Year gala, which has become a custom in the last decade. For instance, last year’s included a northern Chinese dance. But this year’s was the most technically impressive to date. During a martial arts display in which robots performed a choreographed fight against human martial artists, the robots could be seen executing stunts, such as a backflip off a wall. The evolution of the gala’s robotics sketches also provide insights into Chinese peoples’ changing views about the role of technology in their lives and how they are reacting and adapting to government priorities. For example, in another comedy sketch, a grandmother criticized her grandson for not visiting her, instead professing a preference for her humanoid robot “grandsons” that had been taking care of her in his place. This lighthearted segment subtly engaged with traditional social customs, while also signaling awareness of social and demographic issues that the country is currently grappling with.
Besides technology and AI, the gala also hit other national priorities, including manufacturing. Gala organizers chose to highlight Yiwu, a county-level city in Zhejiang province best known for its manufacturing and e-commerce sectors. The announcers touted key manufacturing statistics and encouraged viewers to go out and spend more, in line with the government incentives issued at the New Year to lift consumption levels (Xinhua, February 12).
Longstanding Gala Segments Receive Less Attention
Each year, the gala includes a military segment. This year was no different, featuring a section that was army-heavy and featured People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Army soldiers stationed in Qinghai Province. The troops assured the audience that the frontier was well-defended and that people would not have to worry about their own safety. But aside from this obligatory PLA song segment and a small clip of the September 2025 military parade, military strength was not in the foreground, providing no indication that the CCP is preparing its population for war. Perhaps this is due to a desire to emphasize other priorities. But it could also reflect a need to minimize attention on an organization that has been beset with corruption scandals in recent months (China Brief, January 26). The country’s space program, meanwhile, which has been featured in performances and transition segments in recent years, was omitted from the event altogether.
Other segments touched on a range of themes that the Party views as important. Agriculture and food security, for instance, were celebrated by touting the biggest grain harvest on record (Global Times, January 22). Ethnic unity, another common theme, was demonstrated with a children’s fashion show. Children from each of the country’s official 55 ethnic minority groups catwalked down a runway in their respective culture’s traditional clothes—a common way in which official media tends to portray minority cultures. Traditional culture was also celebrated in the form of Peking opera, traditional instruments like the pipa, historic calligraphy, and Han dynasty statues of horses.
The Gala closes every year with the song “Tonight is Unforgettable” (难忘今宵), but this year’s performance featured a new arrangement with stronger pop music elements. Perhaps the biggest surprise of the night was an appearance by John Legend, who sang his 2013 hit “All of Me,” as well as a Disney theme song with French singer Hélène Rollès. This was the second year in a row that an American artist participated in the Gala, as it seeks to draw in a wider international audience and attempts to signal the country’s openness in the upcoming year.
Conclusion
This content of the 2026 Spring Festival Gala indicated that national leaders are in an ebullient mood when it comes to the country’s advances in AI and robotics. After years of investment, these industries took center stage, as the PRC continues to portray itself as at the cutting edge of modernity. The annual event is a useful signal for gauging the national mood and policy priorities, even if it is not an explicitly political event. This year’s affair held few surprises, but it indicated that observers should expect more of the same in the coming year in terms of economic priorities: more promotion of AI, more commercialization of robotics, and continued efforts to promote domestic consumption and drive exports.
