AI models including Seedance 2.0 take the stage at Spring Festival Gala, delivering a visual feast. Photo: Screenshot from CCTV's Spring Festival Gala program

China's much-anticipated Seedance 2.0, the latest AI video model developed by ByteDance, the Chinese parent company of TikTok, made its debut at the nationwide program since its recent launch, contributing to the production of visual content for several segments of China's 2026 Spring Festival Gala as the show lit up screens across the country and beyond.

The show underscores how large models can be applied in stage and visual production, highlighting the vast potential of Chinese AI as it steps onto a broader stage of applications, a Chinese expert said.

The new video model provided technical support for stage presentations and once again drew widespread attention. The visuals generated by Seedance 2.0 blended seamlessly with the live stage setting, creating the effect of a traditional Chinese style short film unfolding organically on stage.

In one performance at the Spring Festival Gala, audiences could see multiple versions of the young Chinese actress Liu Haocun appearing simultaneously in different parts of the stage. One turned gracefully, another leapt into the air, while others performed different movements, instantly captivating viewers. In reality, however, there was only one live performer on stage.

The technique behind this begins with spatial video technology, which captures detailed visual data to build a high precision digital avatar of the actress. During the live performance, the system reads real time signals from the on site directing system and stage lighting, allowing the avatars to move in sync with the rhythm of the show. It then renders the visuals instantly and feeds them directly into the live broadcast, creating a seamless blend between the physical stage and the virtual elements, the CCTV report said. 

In another segment, the national treasure ink painting "Six Steeds" made its screen debut in dynamic form. The six spirited horses in the artwork came to life with the support of the AI technology, performing complex movements such as galloping and leaping. Coordinated with smooth camera transitions, the sequence transformed what had once existed only in viewers' imagination into a vivid stage presentation.

As the stage embraced technological upgrades, the livestream experience also improved. Using Speech Recognition Model 2.0 of Doubao, ByteDance's AI assistant, the Spring Festival Gala livestream on the social media platform Douyin added an "accessible broadcast" feature with real-time AI subtitles, helping more viewers follow the show smoothly and effortlessly.

Recently, Li Liang, vice president of Douyin, said on Sunday that the 2026 CCTV Spring Festival Gala became the world's first publicly released project to extensively use the domestically developed AI video generation model Seedance 2.0.

The debut of the new AI video model at the annual Spring Festival Gala quickly became a hot topic on China's social media platform Weibo, drawing around 24.7 million views and more than 6,000 comments as of Thursday's press time.

This has also attracted the attention of certain foreign media outlets, which followed the AI video segment closely in addition to the Chinese tech company Unitree's robot dancing performance, another high-tech highlight of the gala that amazed the audience.

"It wasn't just Unitree. Across the Spring Festival Gala this year, China's growing tech capabilities - and the fierce competition within its high-tech sector - were on full display," the CNN report, mentioning the AI video-generation model Seedance 2.0, which participated in the visual creation of multiple programs.

During the Spring Festival Gala, Volcano Engine, the cloud service platform of ByteDance, deeply integrated AI technologies including Doubao's video generation model Seedance 2.0, image creation model Seedream, and spatial video into stage production, according to the company's official WeChat account on Tuesday.

Beyond the performances themselves, this year's gala also used AI to drive real time interactive creation for the public for the first time. On the day of the show, Doubao powered AI interactions reached 1.9 billion, with the Doubao large model peaking at approximately 63.3 billion tokens processed per minute, said the company.

This came just less than a week after Seedance 2.0 was officially released on February 12, a moment that already drew wide attention and surprises at home and abroad, with filmmakers, AI engineers and digital artists dissected frame rates, lighting transitions and motion coherence - and many were amazed at how quickly the technology had matured.

Even Elon Musk, owner of xAI, summed up the accelerating pace of AI development in a brief but telling comment beneath related content: "It's happening fast."

This year's Spring Festival Gala not only highlighted the creative potential of AI in visual arts, but also showcased the broader practical applications of China's AI technologies, Xiang Ligang, director-general of the Zhongguancun Modern Information Consumer Application Industry Technology Alliance, a telecom industry association, told the Global Times on Thursday. 

The show served as a window into the capabilities of large models and their real impact on the creative industry, signaling that Chinese AI is stepping onto a wider stage of applications, Xiang said.

The impressive AI results come as no surprise. With strong government support and booming market demand, China's robust industrial ecosystem and infrastructure allow video generation models like Seedance to be developed and deployed rapidly, paving the way for more widespread applications as Chinese AI continues to advance, the expert said.