Recently, ZTE announced at its 2025 Annual Performance Conference that it is working with ByteDance and related ecosystem partners to advance the development and certification of the next-generation Doubao AI phone. The product is expected to be officially released in the mid to late second quarter of 2026. This collaboration marks further deepening of both parties in the AI Native terminal field, aiming to achieve an evolution from the traditional "human operating the phone" to the "AI operating on behalf of the user" interaction mode through system-level integration of large model capabilities.
Looking back at previous efforts, ZTE's sub-brand Nubia launched a technical preview version of the Doubao AI assistant at the end of last year, which achieved cross-application natural language execution capabilities with system-level permissions. ZTE Communications Vice President Bo Gang defined it as the "autonomous driving" of phone interaction. This model integrates large models deeply into the operating system's underlying layer, rather than simply stacking plugins. In addition to the Doubao series, ZTE has also simultaneously developed its self-developed intelligent agent platform "Co-Claw" (codename "Crab"), and plans to launch related models within the year.
Currently, the global AI phone market has entered a period of explosive growth. IDC predicts that by 2026, the shipment of new generation AI phones in China will reach 147 million units, with a market share exceeding 50% for the first time, becoming the core engine driving industry growth. In the context of a sharp increase in the deployment of large models on the edge, the ecological collaboration model between ZTE and ByteDance not only demonstrates the efficient integration after hardware manufacturers and large model manufacturers have been deeply decoupled, but also indicates that AI intelligents will become a key battlefield in the competition of future smart terminals.
