WeChat's AI assistant "Xiaowei" is currently in grayscale beta testing, and 36Kr has secured early access. The assistant, powered by WeChat's proprietary WeLM model with some responses from DeepSeek, integrates with core WeChat features like mini-programs, chats, Moments, and video accounts. However, despite its capabilities, Xiaowei remains limited in several key areas, reflecting WeChat's cautious approach to AI deployment.
What Xiaowei Cannot Do
Xiaowei cannot handle any payment-related tasks. Users must manually enter payment passwords for transactions like sending red packets. It also cannot post Moments or video account content directly—it can only generate drafts. The assistant cannot check if a specific friend has messaged you, nor can it schedule delayed messages—it only sets reminders. Ordering food via mini-programs is cumbersome, requiring multiple confirmation steps that take longer than doing it manually.
Conditional Capabilities
Some features work but with restrictions. Sending messages or making WeChat calls requires manual confirmation on a card before execution. Xiaowei can read chat content but only one message at a time—batch reading is not supported. It can show friends' recently liked articles but hides who liked them. For Moments, it only retrieves posts from the last two days. Product recommendations are limited to items from WeChat Store. Similarly, it can summarize public account articles but requires users to copy and paste links instead of forwarding them directly.
Where Xiaowei Excels
Xiaowei performs well in analyzing images and files, providing summaries and insights. It can recommend books, TV shows, games, music, public accounts, and video accounts, often with direct links to WeChat Read or mini-games. It summarizes public account and video account content effectively and can review recent spending, generating categorized summaries and pie charts.
Impressive Complex Tasks
Xiaowei shines in handling multi-step tasks like travel planning. It can book flights and hotels via Ctrip mini-program within minutes, asking clarifying questions about preferences. It also provides source links for web search results, ensuring transparency. Notably, product recommendations are ad-free. Voice recognition is highly accurate, understanding even misheard commands. Finally, content generated by Xiaowei can be shared as cards in chats.
Overall, Xiaowei integrates with most WeChat features but operates with significant guardrails due to privacy, security, and trust concerns. As a super app with over 1.432 billion monthly active users (WeChat and WeChat Work combined), WeChat is proceeding cautiously, viewing Xiaowei as an initial exploration into AI rather than a full deployment.