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Chinese internet giants have launched their fall recruitment campaigns, targeting 2026 graduates with a growing demand for positions related to artificial intelligence (AI), algorithms and other emerging technologies.  

Alibaba on Tuesday officially launched its fall recruitment campaign and plans to make more than 7,000 job offers among its 15 business groups and companies, the company said in a WeChat post. 

Compared with the spring recruitment, Alibaba's autumn recruitment has intensified its focus on hiring AI talent, with related positions accounting for more than 60 percent of the total. Some AI business units have an even higher proportion, with Alibaba Cloud, Alibaba International and DingTalk at 80 percent, and Amap at 75 percent.

Taobao and Tmall Group under Alibaba on Tuesday announced its recruitment launch. The group said in a WeChat post that it will focus on nurturing algorithm and AI talent starting from campus recruitment. Among the 2026 autumn recruitment positions, technical roles account for 90 percent of the total. 

On Monday, ByteDance announced through a WeChat post that it is offering more than 5,000 job opportunities, with occupations in research and development positions increasing 23 percent and product positions doubling compared with last year. 

ByteDance's demand for sectors such as algorithms is showing significant growth, according to the WeChat post. Compared with the company's 2025 campus recruitment scale of more than 4,000 hires, this recruitment cycle shows a significant expansion, according to Jiemian News. 

On July 29, Meituan announced the launch of campus recruitment for 2026, with 6,000 offers covering more than 100 positions among 10 categories. Among the recruitment focuses, the company highlighted the demand for global AI talent, according to the company's WeChat post. 

The enhanced demand for AI and related talent comes amid the wide adoption of AI technologies across multiple sectors, from traditional industrial upgrading to innovative development, Liu Dingding, a veteran tech industry analyst, told the Global Times on Tuesday.

The expansion of job roles also reflects the country's continuous innovation and growing technological advantages, which is a major trend recognized and embraced by domestic enterprises, leading to their full investment in it. The more companies invest, the faster the pace of AI development will be accelerated, according to Liu. 

AI has not only driven explosive growth in related job roles but is also reshaping talent skill demands. In 2024, the number of Chinese enterprises developing or applying AI grew by 36 percent year-on-year, according to data sent to the Global Times by domestic recruitment platform zhaopin.com.  

In the first half of 2025, the number of AI-related job postings, including data annotators, algorithm engineers and robot algorithm engineers, surged by more than 40 percent year-on-year on the platform. Meanwhile, the average monthly number of job postings requiring proficiency with large-scale AI models increased by 57 percent compared with 2024.

However, AI-related positions are currently the most talent-starved in China, with a supply-demand ratio well below 1.0, according to professional networking platform Maimai. McKinsey & Company forecasts that China will require 6 million AI professionals by 2030, but could face a shortfall of 4 million, the Xinhua News Agency reported in May.  

To address the widening talent gap, China's educational institutions and industry leaders are stepping up their efforts. More than 500 universities now offer AI-related majors or have launched dedicated schools related to the field. Tsinghua University and Renmin University of China included AI in their 2025 enrollment expansion plans, and Nankai University introduced more than 130 specialized courses under its AI talent development initiative last year, per the report. 

China is actively promoting the integration of industry, academia and research, encouraging collaboration between universities and enterprises to jointly customize AI talent training and provide a stronger reserve of AI professionals to meet the needs of AI development, said Pan Helin, a member of the Expert Committee for the Information and Communication Economy under the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. 
 
At the local level, many regions are taking measures to retain AI professionals by addressing housing, social security, and talent subsidies, Pan told the Global Times on Tuesday.