Chinas J-20 upgrades to anchor networked air war over Taiwan

China’s decision to upgrade the J-20 with advanced radar, engines and AI signals a shift from platform competition to system-level air warfare as it prepares for a Taiwan contingency.

This month, the South China Morning Post (SCMP) reported that China plans to upgrade its J-20 stealth fighter with improved radar, engines and AI to reinforce the aircraft’s role at the core of the People’s Liberation Army Air Force’s (PLAAF) future combat operations, a military analyst said on state television.

Speaking on China Central Television (CCTV), analyst Zhang Xuefeng said the fifth-generation jet, developed by Chengdu Aircraft Corporation, is already operating alongside stealth attack drones and early-warning aircraft, highlighting China’s push toward integrated, networked air warfare.

The comments came as the J-20 marked the 15th anniversary of its maiden flight in Chengdu in January 2011; the aircraft entered active service in 2017 and is widely seen as China’s most advanced answer to US stealth fighters.

While its low-observable design, internal weapons bays and supersonic cruise capabilities are established, future gains would come from internal systems, including more capable radar and infrared sensors, longer-range and more resilient air-to-air missiles, and continued engine upgrades following the transition from Russian AL-31 engines to domestically produced WS-series powerplants.

Zhang said AI would be a key focus, assisting pilots in beyond-visual-range (BVR) combat and complex engagements. China operates multiple J-20 variants, including the two-seat J-20S designed to control drone swarms, and produces roughly 120 aircraft annually as it also tests next-generation stealth fighters.

But how could China use the J-20 in combat operations? Zhang notes that during a Taiwan conflict’s opening phase, the People’s Liberation Army Rocket Force (PLARF) ballistic and hypersonic missile strikes would suppress key Taiwanese radar sites. At the same time, he says the People’s Liberation Army Ground Force (PLAGF) long‑range fires hit ground targets.

He notes that after creating gaps in Taiwan’s defenses, the J-20 would conduct stealth penetration, break the remaining air‑defense network, and seize air superiority over Taiwan’s F‑16 fleet, which he describes as a generational mismatch.

He also highlights J-20 coordination with J-16D electronic warfare aircraft, GJ-11 stealth drones, and KJ-500 AEW&C, allowing China to compress detection, jamming, strike, and command into a single operational cycle.

The J-20 and J-35 form China’s high-end force, with the J-20 penetrating enemy airspace and achieving air superiority, while the J-35 is a carrier-based fighter. China’s J-16 and J-11s ensure aircraft availability and mass.

The J-20 and J-35 offer qualitative advantages, while J-16 and J-11s offer quantitative ones. Although the J-20 is not as old as the US F-22, China may see limited upgrade potential. The J-36 could address J-20’s design limits with next-gen features and future upgrade capacity.

Looking at the J-20’s upgrades, SCMP reported in June 2025 that silicon carbide (SiC) semiconductors have tripled the J‑20’s radar detection range, giving the fighter a far more substantial first‑mover advantage. The report notes these chips enhance radar power, missile accuracy, and even laser‑weapon performance, making them a core element of China’s defense technology.

For manned-unmanned teaming (MUM-T), Asia Times reported in November 2025 about China’s demonstration of the J‑20 flying alongside the GJ‑11 unmanned combat air vehicle (UCAV) and J-16D electronic warfare aircraft. While Chinese state media emphasized autonomous coordination through a digital battlefield network, genuine autonomy and resilient command‑and‑control remain developmental.

As for engine upgrades to the J-20 airframe, the US Department of Defense’s (DoD) 2023 China Military Power Report (CMPR) notes that indigenous WS-15 engines significantly improve agility, range, and combat persistence while increasing the missile load, preserving low observability, adding thrust-vectoring nozzles, and enabling supercruise.

Overall, these developments signal China’s intent to operationalize AI-assisted air combat, even as training, doctrine, and centralized decision-making continue to constrain real-world autonomy.

But how would the J-20 fare against US stealth fighters, such as the F-22 and F-35? Maya Carlin, in an August 2025 article for The National Interest (TNI), says that China’s J-20 is a serious but inferior challenge to the US F-22.

Carlin says while the J-20 has advantages in range, thrust, speed, and possibly ceiling, offering strong theoretical performance, the -22’s decisive strengths include a larger missile load, an internal cannon, proven engines, mature maintenance and operational experience. She quotes US officials who say the J-20 is not yet dominant, and that the F-22’s reliability, weapons, and combat-tested systems keep it ahead.

In a separate June 2024 TNI article, Brent Eastwood assesses the J-20 against the F-35, concluding that the US jet holds the overall advantage despite the Chinese fighter posing a credible threat. Eastwood notes that while the J-20 is faster, has a more extended range, and could use supercruise to threaten US support aircraft, the F-35 is stealthier, enabling a first-look, first-shot advantage.

He highlights the J-20’s lack of an internal cannon and its pilots’ lack of combat experience as key weaknesses, adding that the F-35’s lighter airframe, mature systems, and highly experienced pilot cadre tilt the balance in the US’s favor, even as the J-20 remains a formidable adversary.

However, these assessments are based on the assumptions that the US has enough stealth fighters and that it can deploy its fighters quickly to intervene in a Taiwan conflict. Low US aircraft readiness rates and the vulnerability of US airfields may nullify whatever qualitative advantages it has against China.

An October 2024 US Government Accountability Office (GAO) report finds that despite increased sustainment spending from 2018–2023, neither the F-22 nor F-35 met mission-capable goals. It notes F-22 readiness remains constrained by maintenance and supply issues, while F-35 availability is undermined by depot delays, contractor dependence, limited technical data, and rising sustainment costs.

Furthermore, Asia Times noted this month that China’s expanding surveillance‑and‑missile “kill chain” makes US Pacific airbases highly vulnerable in a Taiwan conflict.

PLA writings emphasize destroying US airbases early to prevent fighters and bombers from taking off. Also, China’s intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) network of +359 satellites and over-the-horizon (OTH) radar, along with the PLARF’s substantial missile arsenal, can reliably target fixed US bases across the Western Pacific.

Wargames conducted by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in January 2023 show that the US could lose 300–500 aircraft in the opening weeks, with 90% destroyed on the ground. Missile strikes could shut down runways in Japan for up to 12 days and prevent tanker operations for over a month, severely limiting US sortie rates and giving China a potential 30‑day window of air superiority.

Together, J-20 upgrades and China’s expanding missile-ISR complex suggest that in a Taiwan conflict, access to the air war may matter as much as aircraft quality, potentially blunting US advantages before its most capable fighters can be brought into play.