Tencent Says 100,000 Teachers Have Claimed WorkBuddy's Free Education Edition
Tencent's public relations director Zhang Jun said on October 22 that more than 100,000 teachers had claimed the WorkBuddy Education Public-Welfare Edition, covering 1,467 cities and 45,000 schools nationwide, with credits now being distributed.
The figure marks a rapid ramp-up for a product that had been live for three days, making it one of the more widely distributed teacher-facing AI tools in China.
The education edition went live on October 19 and is open to all in-service teachers, with no regional or school-stage restrictions. Each teacher receives 2,000 credits per month for 12 consecutive months, usable across teaching research and lesson design, academic administration, project-based learning, home-school communication and personalised student support.
Credits are topped up automatically on the first day of each month and will be distributed through December 2027. When monthly credits are exhausted, teachers can continue on the free base model so that teaching is not interrupted.
WorkBuddy packages high-frequency teaching tasks into ready-made entry points covering instructional design, home-school collaboration, student development and professional growth, alongside classroom jobs such as creative teaching, scripted classroom scenarios, courseware production and material processing.
The development team worked with Peking University, Beijing Normal University and other universities to embed 209 education expert personas into the product, spanning needs from polishing open classes and writing papers to parent communication.
Shenzhen's Futian District is the first district to adopt the tool at scale, with more than 110 schools and close to 13,000 teachers already equipped.
Access follows two routes. Schools and district education bureaus submit teacher information in bulk for centralised activation, while individual teachers can enter the application through the menu of the Tencent WorkBuddy WeChat account, fill in their teaching credentials and be approved within three working days.
The education edition was jointly developed by Tencent's Sustainable Social Value digital education lab and the WorkBuddy team. It is set to integrate with Tencent Docs, the Lexiang knowledge base and ima, bringing documents, shared knowledge bases and collaborative editing into teachers' daily workflows. It runs on both WeChat mini-program and desktop, with education-edition credits and data kept separate from personal WorkBuddy accounts.
Rather than selling per-seat licences, Tencent is subsidising usage through a credit allowance, an approach that stands out among AI teaching assistants, most of which monetise per teacher or per school. Tencent SSV said it will keep iterating features for classroom teaching, teaching research and school administration based on frontline feedback.
The figure marks a rapid ramp-up for a product that had been live for three days, making it one of the more widely distributed teacher-facing AI tools in China.
The education edition went live on October 19 and is open to all in-service teachers, with no regional or school-stage restrictions. Each teacher receives 2,000 credits per month for 12 consecutive months, usable across teaching research and lesson design, academic administration, project-based learning, home-school communication and personalised student support.
Credits are topped up automatically on the first day of each month and will be distributed through December 2027. When monthly credits are exhausted, teachers can continue on the free base model so that teaching is not interrupted.
WorkBuddy packages high-frequency teaching tasks into ready-made entry points covering instructional design, home-school collaboration, student development and professional growth, alongside classroom jobs such as creative teaching, scripted classroom scenarios, courseware production and material processing.
The development team worked with Peking University, Beijing Normal University and other universities to embed 209 education expert personas into the product, spanning needs from polishing open classes and writing papers to parent communication.
Shenzhen's Futian District is the first district to adopt the tool at scale, with more than 110 schools and close to 13,000 teachers already equipped.
Access follows two routes. Schools and district education bureaus submit teacher information in bulk for centralised activation, while individual teachers can enter the application through the menu of the Tencent WorkBuddy WeChat account, fill in their teaching credentials and be approved within three working days.
The education edition was jointly developed by Tencent's Sustainable Social Value digital education lab and the WorkBuddy team. It is set to integrate with Tencent Docs, the Lexiang knowledge base and ima, bringing documents, shared knowledge bases and collaborative editing into teachers' daily workflows. It runs on both WeChat mini-program and desktop, with education-edition credits and data kept separate from personal WorkBuddy accounts.
Rather than selling per-seat licences, Tencent is subsidising usage through a credit allowance, an approach that stands out among AI teaching assistants, most of which monetise per teacher or per school. Tencent SSV said it will keep iterating features for classroom teaching, teaching research and school administration based on frontline feedback.
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