China Technology Monitor 2026
China on its way to becoming the leading technology nation
One of the reasons why China is taking such an aggressive stance in the trade conflict with the US is the significant progress it has made in strategically relevant technologies in recent years. The transition from high-quality production to high-quality research and development is a relatively recent development in China, which first became apparent around 2015. Ten years later, in 2025, China is the leader in many cutting-edge technologies or ranks second behind the US.
EconSight first highlighted this development in its China 2025 analysis for the World Economic Forum 2025. We have now developed our EconSight China Technology Monitor, in which we will regularly track China’s development in relevant technologies in comparison with the US and the European Union.
The analysis is based on world-class patents in selected technologies. The identification of world-class patents is based on the EconSight Patent Score and shows the top 10% of patents per technology and country.
China Technology Monitor
The interactive chart shows the position of China and other selected countries in 25 future technologies. The position is the share of the respective country in the total number of world-class patents in the respective technology – the global share. For better readability, individual countries can be shown or hidden by clicking on the legend. The comparison with 2020 or with 2024 can also be shown or hidden. This shows the massive leap that China has made in many technologies in recent years and also the significant growth from 2024 to 2025.
China Monitor 2026 – US dominance in biomedicine remains intact, but China is closing or has closed the gap nearly everywhere else, with the rest of the world treading water.
Across 25 strategic technologies tracked between 2024 and 2025, the most striking finding is also the simplest: China gained world patent share in all 25 fields, while the United States lost share in all 25. No exceptions either way. On average, China’s share rose by +4.0 percentage points per technology and the US fell by −3.3 pp, while the EU (−0.3 pp), Japan (−0.8 pp), and Korea (+0.1 pp) were broadly stable.
Leadership in 2025 is split US 11, China 10, Japan 4. The US retains commanding fortresses in biomedicine and medical devices, Surgical Robots (84.7 %), Gene Therapy (73.7 %), and Precision Medicine (71.8 %), alongside leadership in Encryption, Autonomous Driving, Smart City, Photonics, Digital Twin, Vertical Farming, Humanoid Robots, and Silicon Photovoltaics. China leads in Smart Grid (64.9 %), Neural Networks & Deep Learning, Generative AI, Smart Factory, Digital Agriculture, Image Analysis, Wind Energy, Cosmonautics & Satellites, Robotics, and Lithium Batteries. Japan continues to lead in EUV Photolithography, Solid State Batteries, Electric Vehicles, and Fuel Cells, though each position weakened year on year.
Three technologies flipped leadership in a single year, all toward China: Robotics (from US), Lithium Batteries (from Japan), and Cosmonautics & Satellite Tech (from US). Humanoid Robots and Digital Twin are the next plausible flips, with margins now under 3 pp. China’s largest single gain was in Digital Twin (+11.1 pp), almost exactly mirroring the US’s largest single decline in the same field.
The EU is stable but does not lead in any of the 25 technologies. Its best positions are EUV Photolithography (28.8 %), Wind Energy (27.8 %, but eroding), and Gene Therapy (24.7 %). Modest positive trends are visible in EUV Photolithography (+1.6 pp), Electric Vehicles, Fuel Cells, Surgical Robots, and Autonomous Driving. Wind Energy (−2.4 pp) is the EU’s most material loss and bears watching.
