Alibaba’s Qwen AI Gives Away Free Milk Tea — Stores Nationwide Swamped With Orders

Chinese milk tea shops just survived what netizens are calling the “AI boba apocalypse.” 🧋🔥

In early February, ahead of Lunar New Year, Alibaba’s AI app Qwen (Tongyi Qianwen) launched a massive campaign dubbed the “Spring Festival 3 Billion Free Orders.” On February 6, users who downloaded the latest Qwen app could simply type or say, “Help me order a milk tea,” and receive a 25 RMB no-threshold coupon. The catch? You only had to pay 0.01 RMB — basically one cent.

The offer covered more than 300,000 stores nationwide, including major chains like Heytea, Nayuki, Mixue Bingcheng, and Bawang Chaji.

The result? Absolute chaos. Within 3 hours, orders topped 1 million cups. In 9 hours, they reportedly passed 10 million. Some stores temporarily closed under the pressure. Printers overheated. Delivery riders lined up outside tea shops. The Qwen app itself lagged and crashed multiple times as traffic surged.

Alibaba later apologized, expanded server capacity, and extended the coupon validity to February 28.

It wasn’t just a promo — it was a flex. While other tech giants handed out cash, Alibaba made AI “do something” in the real world. And apparently, what people wanted most… was milk tea. 🥤💻