Alibaba Launches Qwen3.5 AI Model for Agentic AI Era

Alibaba unveiled Qwen3.5, an AI model designed for independent task execution, on February 16, 2026. The company claims significant performance and cost improvements, outperforming major U.S. rivals on several benchmarks. Qwen3.5 is 60% cheaper and eight times more efficient at handling large workloads than its predecessor. It features "visual agentic capabilities" to act across mobile and desktop apps. Alibaba aims to boost adoption of its Qwen chatbot amid competition from ByteDance's Doubao and DeepSeek.