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U.S. vs. China: Capability of the Best AI Model
Highest Epoch Capabilities Index score reached by a model from each country’s developers, monthly
Plays the chart through its history. Pauses are where the data set a record or moved most.
Epoch AI (CC BY 4.0). A model counts for a country when one of its developers is based there. Each line is the best score among models released by that month; it rises when a new model beats the old best. From January 2024, when Epoch had scored enough Chinese models to show a frontier.
The Epoch Capabilities Index puts every model on one scale built from about forty benchmarks. The two lines trace the best model each country has released: the U.S. line has stayed on top, and the distance between them is the race.
What this chart reads
- United States · Best AI Model Capability (Epoch Capabilities Index)as “Best U.S. model”latest 2026-10-01
- China · Best AI Model Capability (Epoch Capabilities Index)as “Best Chinese model”latest 2026-10-01
Sources
United States · Best AI Model Capability (Epoch Capabilities Index). Source: Epoch AI, Epoch Capabilities Index (epoch.ai/eci). CC BY 4.0. Rewritten weekly, because Epoch re-estimates every score when it adds benchmarks.
China · Best AI Model Capability (Epoch Capabilities Index). Source: Epoch AI, Epoch Capabilities Index (epoch.ai/eci). CC BY 4.0. Rewritten weekly, because Epoch re-estimates every score when it adds benchmarks.
Charts are drawn from Palanor's signal library and recomputed from source data on every view. Transformations (changes, indexing, year-on-year rates) are Palanor's.