Coaley Peak GEO Research Centre Engine guide
Tencent Yuanbao 腾讯元宝 How Tencent's assistant searches WeChat and the web, and how a brand gets cited.
Tencent Yuanbao (腾讯元宝) is Tencent's AI assistant, launched in May 2024 and now a contact inside Weixin, the Chinese version of WeChat. Its search draws on WeChat Official Accounts, Weixin Search and Sogou as well as the web. This guide covers its timeline, the four layers behind its answers, the crawler gap and what a brand can control.
Independent guide: Coaley Peak is not associated with Tencent. Trademarks
- Owner
- Tencent
- Launched
- 30 May 2024
- Home market
- Mainland China
- Languages
- Chinese
- Open weights
- Hy3 and Hy4 preview under Apache 2.0
- Crawlers
- Sogou's spider is documented; no Tencent AI crawler
Overview
What Tencent Yuanbao is, and who uses it
Tencent launched Yuanbao on 30 May 2024, built on its Hunyuan models, with AI search drawing on Weixin Search (微信搜一搜), Sogou and articles from WeChat Official Accounts (公众号). In February 2025 it added DeepSeek R1 as an option, and in April 2025 Yuanbao became a contact that people can chat with inside Weixin itself, which with WeChat has about 1.44 billion monthly users.
Tencent said in February 2026 that Yuanbao had passed 50 million daily users and 114 million monthly users. The models behind it were renamed Tencent HY in December 2025: Hy3, released in July 2026 under Apache 2.0, and Hy4 preview, a 770-billion-parameter model open-sourced in August 2026.
Yuanbao is a mainland-China service. Its iOS app is listed only in the mainland China and Hong Kong App Stores, not the UK's, and its web version is at yuanbao.tencent.com.
For brands, Yuanbao is the clearest case of a walled garden feeding an AI assistant. WeChat Official Account articles are a named source for its answers, alongside Sogou and the open web, but Tencent documents no AI crawler and no publisher opt-out. Being visible means publishing where Tencent looks.
Timeline
Tencent Yuanbao, from launch to today
Tencent is founded in Shenzhen.
Tencent lists on the Main Board of the Hong Kong Stock Exchange.
Sogou's going-private merger completes, making it wholly owned by Tencent.
Tencent launches its Hunyuan large language model, with more than 100 billion parameters.
Yuanbao launches on Hunyuan, with AI search drawing on Weixin Search, Sogou and WeChat Official Accounts.
DeepSeek R1, with web search, is added to Yuanbao as an option.
Weixin begins testing AI search with DeepSeek R1, drawing on Official Accounts and web content.
A revised Yuanbao user agreement makes the use of users' content for model training opt-in.
Yuanbao becomes available as a chat contact inside Weixin.
Tencent renames its model brand from Hunyuan to Tencent HY, days after releasing HY 2.0.
Tencent says Yuanbao has passed 50 million daily users and 114 million monthly users.
Hy3 preview is released under a community licence that excludes the UK, the EU and South Korea.
Hy3 is officially launched under Apache 2.0 and built into Yuanbao.
Hy4 preview, with 770 billion parameters and a one-million-token context, is released as open weights.
Things to know
Things to know about Tencent Yuanbao
WeChat Official Account articles are a named source for Yuanbao's AI search, so publishing on an Official Account is a documented route into Tencent's AI answers.
Answers mix Official Account articles with third-party web pages, so a crawlable, indexable website still matters alongside WeChat content.
Sogou, wholly owned by Tencent since 2021, is one of Yuanbao's named search sources. Its own share of search in China is small (2.61% on StatCounter in September 2026), but it feeds Yuanbao.
Tencent documents no crawler for Yuanbao, Weixin Search or Hy training. The only documented crawler in the chain is Sogou's.
Sogou publishes no IP list; verify its spider with a reverse DNS lookup to a .sogou.com hostname.
Users can choose between Tencent's Hy models and DeepSeek R1, both with web search.
Tencent says Weixin's AI search uses only Official Account and public web content, not chats or Moments.
Yuanbao is not in the UK App Store: it is listed only in the mainland China and Hong Kong storefronts. The web version is at yuanbao.tencent.com.
Tencent reports that Hy3's hallucination rate fell from 12.5% to 5.4% in its internal evaluations, and describes the goal as 'answer when grounded, state when evidence is missing'.
Tencent is testing 'Xiaowei', an agentic AI inside Weixin, and has not said what content sources it will use.
The four layers
How Tencent Yuanbao builds an answer
Every AI answer is made in four layers: what the model learned in pre-training, how it was tuned, what it retrieves live, and how it puts the answer together. Here is each one for Tencent Yuanbao, and what it means for a brand that wants to be cited.
Layer 1
Pre-training: the base (foundation) model
Yuanbao runs on Tencent's own models, renamed from Hunyuan to Tencent HY in December 2025, with DeepSeek R1 as an option since February 2025. Hunyuan launched in 2023 with more than 100 billion parameters. Hy3, released in July 2026, is a mixture of experts with 295 billion parameters (21 billion active); Hy4 preview, released in August 2026, has 770 billion (49 billion active) and a million-token context. Both are open weights under Apache 2.0. Training data sources and cut-offs are not published.
What it means for you: With no published training sources, the safest assumption is that Tencent's models learn from the Chinese web and Tencent's own ecosystem. A brand with consistent facts across its Chinese website and its Official Account tells them the same story twice.
Layer 2
Post-training: tuning and alignment
Tencent says that after Hy3's preview it gathered feedback from more than 50 products and scaled up post-training, combining supervised fine-tuning with reinforcement learning; in its internal evaluations, hallucinations fell from 12.5% to 5.4%. Yuanbao is subject to China's generative AI rules and content-labelling measures. Under its March 2025 user agreement, users' content trains Tencent's models only if they opt in.
What it means for you: Tencent tunes Hy to answer when the evidence supports it and to say when evidence is missing. That rewards brands whose facts are easy to find and to verify in the sources Yuanbao searches.
Layer 3
Retrieval: live search
Tencent said at launch that Yuanbao's AI search uses Weixin Search and Sogou, covering WeChat Official Accounts and other Tencent content plus authoritative web sources; a deep search mode followed in July 2024. Weixin's own AI search, tested from February 2025, also draws on Official Accounts and public web content, and Tencent says it does not use chats, Moments or other private data. How these sources are ranked is not published.
What it means for you: Two routes matter: an active WeChat Official Account publishing substantial articles, and a website that Sogou and Weixin Search can crawl and index. Most Western brands have neither, which is why Yuanbao rarely mentions them.
Layer 4
The answer: what people read
Answers that use web search list the reference material used, typically a mix of third-party web pages and Official Account articles, according to press tests. Deep search produces longer reports with outlines and mind maps. The interface labels output as AI-generated and for reference only. Tencent has not published a citation format.
What it means for you: Official Account articles appear as sources beside web pages, so a well-written article on your Official Account can be the citation itself. Write articles that answer specific questions, with your brand and your facts stated plainly.
Crawlers
Tencent Yuanbao's crawlers and user agents
The user-agent tokens to look for in your server logs and to name in robots.txt.
| User-agent token | What it does | robots.txt |
|---|---|---|
| Sogou web spider Documentation | Sogou's search crawler; Sogou search is one of Yuanbao's named sources. Sogou documents only this user-agent value, matched case-sensitively, not a full user-agent string. | Follows robots.txt, Sogou says, though new rules can take several weeks to take effect. |
| Not published (Weixin Search) | No crawler documentation was found for Weixin Search, Yuanbao's other named search source. | Not published |
| Not published (Yuanbao and Hy) | Tencent documents no crawler for training its Hy models and no fetcher for Yuanbao, for example when a user shares a link. | Not published |
Tencent publishes no AI crawler at all, so robots.txt cannot target Yuanbao or Hy training. Sogou's rules are the only documented crawl control in the chain.
Crawl sources
Where Tencent Yuanbao crawls from, and how to verify it
Sogou does not publish its spider's IP list. Its documented check is reverse DNS: genuine Sogou spider hostnames end in .sogou.com, and anything else is an impostor. Sogou's page does not mention a forward lookup, but running one to confirm the hostname returns the same IP is good practice.
Tencent publishes no IP ranges, networks or verification method for any Weixin, Yuanbao or Hy crawler, so there is no way to attribute such traffic in your logs.
Opting out
How to opt out of Tencent Yuanbao, or limit what it uses
Sogou in robots.txt
Use the user-agent value 'Sogou web spider' (case-sensitive) in robots.txt. Sogou says changes can take several weeks and that blocked pages cannot be found in Sogou search. Tencent has not said how this affects Yuanbao.
Official pageReport Sogou crawling too fast
Sogou's complaint form takes reports of its spider crawling too fast, ideally with access logs; Sogou asks sites not to block it outright.
Official pageUse Sogou's webmaster platform
Sogou's resource platform offers site verification, resource submission and index checks. Its listed contact is a Tencent address, zzpt@tencent.com.
Official pageSubmit a site, or ask for a block to be lifted
Submit a site to Sogou through its URL feedback form, and ask for a block or penalty to be lifted, once problems are fixed, through its complaint form.
Official pageNo publisher opt-out from AI
Tencent documents no AI crawler token and no way for publishers to opt out of Yuanbao, Weixin's AI search or Hy training.
Users' own content
Under Yuanbao's March 2025 user agreement, users' uploaded and generated content is used to improve Tencent's models only if they switch on its Experience Optimisation Plan.
There is no documented way to keep your content out of Yuanbao's answers or Tencent's training, short of not publishing it. Blocking Sogou removes you from one of Yuanbao's sources without stopping the others. For brands in China, the goal is to be present and accurate in Tencent's ecosystem.
How we help
How we get brands cited in Tencent Yuanbao
The Coaley Peak GEO Research Centre researches and implements GEO for SEO agencies and in-house teams, with foreign markets as our speciality.
Yuanbao visibility audit
We ask Yuanbao the Chinese questions your customers ask, with Tencent's models and with DeepSeek, and record which Official Accounts and websites it cites and what it says about you.
WeChat Official Account strategy
Official Account articles are a named Yuanbao source. We help you set up and run an Official Account with substantial, factual articles written to be cited.
Sogou and Weixin Search visibility
We make sure your Chinese website can be crawled by Sogou and found in Weixin Search, verified by reverse DNS, with nothing in your CDN blocking it.
Native Chinese content
With native Chinese writers, we turn your key facts into simplified Chinese pages and articles that answer questions directly.
China market entry
We plan Yuanbao alongside Baidu, Doubao, DeepSeek, Qwen and Kimi, so your China strategy covers the assistants your customers actually use.
More on our research, services and team at the Coaley Peak GEO Research Centre.
FAQ
Tencent Yuanbao GEO: questions
Where does Tencent Yuanbao get its information?
Tencent said at launch that Yuanbao's AI search uses Weixin Search and Sogou, covering WeChat Official Account articles and other Tencent content plus authoritative web sources. Users can also choose DeepSeek R1 with web search.
Does Yuanbao cite its sources?
Answers that use web search list the reference material used, typically a mix of web pages and Official Account articles, according to press tests. Tencent has not published a citation format.
Does Tencent have an AI crawler I can block?
Tencent documents none for Yuanbao, Weixin Search or Hy training. The only documented crawler in the chain is Sogou's, which follows robots.txt under the value 'Sogou web spider'.
Can I use Yuanbao in the UK?
Its iOS app is listed only in the mainland China and Hong Kong App Stores, not the UK's. The web version is at yuanbao.tencent.com.
How do I get my brand into Yuanbao's answers?
Publish substantial, factual articles on a WeChat Official Account, make sure your Chinese website can be crawled by Sogou and found in Weixin Search, and state your facts consistently in both.
Are Tencent's AI models open source?
Hy3 and Hy4 preview are open weights under Apache 2.0. The earlier Hy3 preview's licence excluded the UK, the EU and South Korea, so check each licence before building on them.
Want a free chat about Tencent Yuanbao?
Tell us which market and brand you are working on. If we can help, we will set up a free, no-obligation chat with Stephen or Ethan.
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Independence and trademarks. Tencent, 腾讯, Yuanbao, 元宝, Tencent Hy, Hunyuan, 混元, Weixin, WeChat and Sogou are trademarks of Tencent Holdings Limited or its affiliates. DeepSeek is a trademark of its respective owner. Coaley Peak is independent: we are not associated with, endorsed by or a partner of Tencent. This guide is our own research from public documentation and reputable reporting, checked in October 2026.
Reviewed by Stephen Grindley, research centre lead. Last checked .
Document reference: ISO_webpage_geo_engine_tencent_yuanbao_v1
Last modified: 7 October 2026
GEO Research Centre·Engine guides·Tencent Yuanbao