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China Approves Import of Nvidia's H200 AI Chips amid Domestic Development Push

Artificial Intelligence

Business Honor
28 January, 2026

Approval signifies a shift in China's AI strategy, balancing advanced tech needs with nurturing local semiconductor industry.

China has recently approved Nvidia H200 AI Chips for import making an impact on the China Artificial Intelligence industry. This approval of all those chips is China’s response to its huge need for advanced AI technologies and to create opportunity for creating their own semiconductor Industry.

The first few allotted approvals have already gone to three of China’s largest internet companies and many other companies are now lined up to get approval later. However, the names of the actual companies getting the initial batch of chips have not been announced yet. The approval of these Nvidia H200 chips from the United States is a significant development in the China United States relationship because of restrictions previously put in place by the US regarding the import of H200 chips.

Earlier this month, the U.S. government granted permission to Nvidia to transport its H200 chips to China, but Chinese authorities had yet to provide clearance for shipments, creating uncertainty over whether China will allow the importation of these chips given their stated policy objectives to promote the domestic chip industry. Just a few weeks ago, Chinese customs told agents that H200 chips do not qualify for entry into the country.

Although Huawei and other companies have produced alternative versions of Nvidia's last generation chip, the H20, the H200 provides an approximately six-fold improvement in performance compared to any competing product, so these firms will not be able to keep pace with Nvidia as the latter generates revenue from sales of H200 chips. It is also unclear how many additional companies will be authorized to purchase H200 chips or what criteria China will apply to determine whether they will be granted approval in later shipments.