On 14-15 May 2026, US President Donald Trump is expected to meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing, marking the first US presidential visit to China in eight years. The last president to make the trip was Trump himself, during his first term in 2017. The summit is highly anticipated, following delays earlier this year due to the escalating conflict in Iran.
At a time when the US-China relationship is increasingly defined by competition rather than engagement, this summit will be closely watched by the international community. Topics likely to be on the table include trade – specifically US tariffs and Chinese export controls on critical minerals – Taiwan, technology, the conflict in Iran, and a proposed joint “Board of Trade”.
However, policy analysts warn that expectations for this meeting should be tempered. Rather than delivering a reset, the meeting is best understood as an effort to stabilise this relationship that has become more volatile and less institutionally managed.
The need for stabilisation is clear as US-China leader-level exchanges have fallen over the past three decades. According to analysis by the Asia Society Policy Institute’s Center for China Analysis, US-China leader-level exchanges – including bilateral summits, sideline meetings, and phone calls — have averaged just 2.5 per year this decade, down from 4.6 in the 2010s and 5.6 in the 2000s. Simultaneously, the quality of engagement has weakened as approximately 75% of leader interactions since 2020 have been conducted by phone rather than in person. This decline reflects a broader erosion of institutional ties.
During Trump’s first term, most of the 90 official channels of communication between the US and Chinese governments at all levels went dormant, and, although some resumed under the Biden administration, communication between the two governments remains limited.
A lot has changed since Trump and Xi last met on the sidelines of the APEC Summit in October 2025. At this meeting, Trump and Xi negotiated a temporary truce with the US agreeing to reduce tariffs on Chinese goods, while China agreed to suspend the expansion of its export controls on rare earth elements, resume cooperation on fentanyl, and resume purchases of US soybeans. Beyond easing immediate trade tensions, this meeting highlighted the strategic leverage both sides hold over the other. While the US continues to rely on tariffs as a pressure tool, China’s ability to restrict access to critical minerals and supply chains has emerged as a major source of coercive power, raising questions about how durable this truce will be.
This follow-up meeting in May 2026 is expected to revisit some of the items agreed to in October. However, with Trump’s IEEPA tariffs struck down by the US Supreme Court and the United States in an increasingly drawn-out conflict with Iran, Trump’s leverage and resources are thinner. At the same time, China’s coercive economic tools, including retaliatory tariffs and export controls on rare-earth elements and related compounds, metals and magnets remain ready to deploy.
As these leader-level meetings become less frequent, each carries strategic weight, ensuring that competition remains constrained to reduce the risk of escalating tensions in an increasingly unstable environment. This is particularly important ahead of Trump’s likely return to China for the APEC Summit in November of this year and Xi’s potential visit to the US in December for the G-20 Summit, where follow-through on any commitments will be closely scrutinised.
