Pew Research Center reports that people in 25 of 36 surveyed countries now hold a more favorable view of China than of the United States, according to findings published July 15, 2026. The cross-national polling project, covering 36 to 37 nations, produced two companion reports: "People in Many Countries Now View China More Positively Than the U.S." and "Views of China and Xi Are Improving Globally." Together, they document a shift that has been building since at least 2023.

Across 37 countries, a median of 51% express a favorable opinion of China, compared with 39% unfavorable. Favorable views of China have broadly risen since 2023, while U.S. favorability has declined over the same period, according to the Pew survey.

The United States retains one enduring advantage: respondents still rate the U.S. ahead of China on government respect for personal freedoms, though that gap is narrowing, Pew found. The survey does not report that China has overtaken the U.S. on this measure, only that the distance between the two is shrinking.

The declining U.S. numbers align with a separate Pew report published June 23, 2026, titled "Trump Gets Negative Reviews Internationally as Fewer Say U.S. Is a Reliable Partner," based on the same 36-country survey. That report found international assessments of the U.S. presidency and American reliability worsening, offering a domestic-political factor that lines up with the broader erosion in U.S. favorability.

Inside the United States, the trajectory runs the other way, though from a low starting point. As of 2026, 27% of Americans hold a positive opinion of China, up 6 percentage points from the prior year and nearly double the level recorded in 2023, according to Pew. That figure remains far below a majority, and the April 2026 short read preceded the broader July release by three months.

The geographical scope is wide: the 36-country core survey covers nations across multiple regions, and the 37-country China-specific dataset adds one additional country. Because both reports use the same polling infrastructure, the data allows direct comparison of China and U.S. favorability trends.

What the data does not do is isolate causation. The simultaneous rise in China's favorability and decline in U.S. favorability since 2023 could reflect separate trends, mutually reinforcing dynamics, or respondents re-evaluating both powers in relation to each other. Pew's reports present the numbers; they do not test a single causal model.

The broader context here is what the narrowing gap on personal freedoms may signal. If respondents continue to rate the U.S. higher on civil liberties but lower on overall favorability, the implication is that people in many countries are weighing other factors — economic ties, strategic partnerships — more heavily than rights-based assessments when forming their general view of each nation. That would complicate any assumption that democratic governance is the decisive variable shaping global public opinion of states.

The 25-of-36 figure is also a snapshot, not a full trend line. Pew documents directional movement since 2023, but the exact cross-over point — where China's favorability surpassed that of the U.S. in a majority of surveyed countries — is not precisely dated in the available reporting. What is clear is that the shift occurred within a three-year window and is documented as of mid-2026.

The structural question this raises for governments and institutions is about soft power — the ability to influence others through appeal and attraction rather than coercion. Favorability ratings are a lagging indicator of how well a country's soft power has been working, and a leading indicator of how much diplomatic room a government has to maneuver in a given country. A 51% median favorable rating for China, set against a declining U.S. trajectory, changes the environment in which bilateral negotiations, trade agreements, and security arrangements play out. It does not determine outcomes, but it shifts the cost-benefit calculus for leaders in third countries deciding how closely to align with Washington or Beijing.