China’s trade in services maintained steady growth in 2025, with total imports and exports reaching about 8.08 trillion yuan (about 1.16 trillion U.S. dollars), up 7.4 percent year on year, the Ministry of Commerce said on Thursday.

In the year, service exports rose 14.2 percent to around 3.63 trillion yuan, while imports increased by 2.5 percent to about 4.46 trillion yuan, according to the latest data released by the ministry.

Knowledge-intensive services saw continued growth in trade, with imports and exports in the year totaling 3.09 trillion yuan, up 6.6 percent year on year. Telecommunications, computer, and information services experienced particularly rapid growth in both imports and exports.

The trade surplus in knowledge-intensive services widened by 158.17 billion yuan as compared with 2024.

Besides, travel service trade totaled about 2.21 trillion yuan in 2025, up 7.6 percent from a year earlier. Specifically, travel service exports surged by 49.5 percent year on year, while travel service imports grew by 1.4 percent over the previous year.

Notably, data from the Ministry of Commerce showed that service consumption has increasingly become a key driver of China’s high-quality economic development. From 2020 to 2025, the per capita service consumption expenditure among Chinese residents grew at an average annual rate of 8.5 percent.

"In recent years, with improvements in living standards, Chinese residents have transitioned from prioritizing goods consumption to embracing a more balanced approach between goods and services. Service consumption has increasingly become a vital engine for high-quality economic development. From 2020 to 2025, per capita service consumption expenditure grew at an average annual rate of 8.5 percent, showing a robust growth momentum. Its share in total per capita consumption expenditure rose by 3.5 percentage points, reaching 46.1 percent in 2025 -- nearly half of residents' total consumption,"said Kong Dejun, director of the Department of Trade in Services and Commercial Services under the Ministry of Commerce, at a policy briefing in Beijing on Friday.

"In a coming period of time, China's service consumption will enter an important phase of strategic opportunities, playing a key role in boosting the household consumption rate and advancing high-quality economic development," he added.

Moreover, according to the latest data, robust growth in China's high-tech sectors in recent years has led to rapid expansion in exports of intellectual property royalties.

"Along with enhancement of their research and development capabilities and technological proficiency, Chinese enterprises have gradually built competitive advantages in fields such as artificial intelligence large model technologies, biopharmaceuticals, and advanced manufacturing, which has contributed to promoting China's technology exports and intellectual property licensing in related sectors, and to driving rapid growth in the export of intellectual property royalty services," said Li Jun, director of the Institute of International Trade in Services at the Chinese Academy of International Trade and Economic Cooperation.