Public opinion in Bangladesh has shifted from being almost evenly split between Washington and Beijing to leaning firmly towards China, driven almost entirely by a collapse in favourable views of the US.
The findings come from a comparison of the Pew Research Center's 2024 and 2026 surveys on global perceptions of the US and China.
Bangladeshis already viewed China (55 percent in 2024) slightly more favourably than the US (52 percent in 2024).
China’s lead grew from 3 percentage points in 2024 to 30 percentage points in 2026 -- a tenfold jump in just two years, according to the 2026 study. This shift, however, is less a story of Beijing winning new admirers in Bangladesh than of Washington losing the ones it had.
In 2024, roughly one in two Bangladeshis surveyed (52 percent) viewed the US favourably. By 2026, the figure fell to 26 percent, meaning only one in four Bangladeshis now viewed the US favourably.
Among surveyed nations, only four -- Thailand, Poland, South Korea and Sweden -- recorded a greater fall in favourable views of the US than Bangladesh.
Over the same period, China's standing among Bangladeshis remained virtually unchanged: 55 percent viewed it favourably in 2024, compared to 56 percent in 2026.
For its 2026 study, Pew surveyed more than 42,000 people across 36 countries between February and May. Respondents were asked whether they had a very favourable, somewhat favourable, somewhat unfavourable, or very unfavourable opinion of each superpower.
The think tank also found that the decline in America's image among Bangladeshis became even more pronounced when respondents were asked to evaluate the two countries' leaders.
In 2024, almost half of the respondents (47 percent) expressed confidence that then-US President Joe Biden would "do the right thing regarding world affairs".
Under Donald Trump's second presidency, that confidence dropped by almost half, to 25 percent. In contrast, confidence among Bangladeshi adults in Chinese President Xi Jinping moved in the opposite direction, rising from 51 percent to 61 percent over the same period.
Mohammad Tanzimuddin Khan, professor of International Relations at the Dhaka University, cited two main reasons for the US's declining image in Bangladesh: its failure to support Palestinian demands for justice and its shrinking capacity to provide public goods abroad.
With the US economy under strain, USAID-funded development projects have shut down, weakening one of Washington's key tools for building goodwill.
"All of this together has produced a negative image of the US," he said.
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Two years ago, most of the world still viewed the US more favourably than China. In Pew's 2024 survey of 35 countries, people in 22 held a more favourable view of the US than of China.
By 2026, however, the picture has reversed. In more than two-thirds of the 36 countries surveyed, the public viewed China more favourably than the US. Only six countries still leaned towards Washington, while public opinion remained roughly evenly divided in five.
Across most surveyed nations, favourable opinions of the US fell, with Israel and Hungary being the only exceptions.
South Korea, a close US ally since World War II, illustrates the scale of the shift. In 2024, nearly eight in 10 South Koreans viewed the US favourably. By 2026, that figure has fallen to four in 10.
Prof Tanzimuddin attributes the decline in America's global image to the erosion of the rules-based liberal order that the US has led since 1990.
He pointed to January's US military operations in Venezuela as the starkest example of that erosion.
"Washington's turn towards economic nationalism without reciprocity in trade relations, its aggressive anti-immigration stance, and the growing visibility of racism and white supremacy in American politics have damaged America's global standing," he said.
Bangladesh's tilt away from Washington mirrors that of most of its regional neighbours. Only two countries in the region are moving in the opposite direction. India and the Philippines remain the region's clear outliers, with public opinion favouring the US over China.
Just 15 percent of Pakistanis view the US favourably, compared with 90 percent who hold favourable views of China -- the widest gap recorded in the 2026 survey. People in Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore, Thailand and Sri Lanka also lean towards China.
Positive views of the US have fallen more sharply in high-income countries than in lower- and middle-income ones. In 2024, respondents in high-income countries viewed the US far more favourably than China (57 percent versus 28 percent).
By 2026, favourable views of the US in those countries fell to 38 percent -- a decline of 19 percentage points -- while China's rating has risen to 40 percent, an increase of 12 percentage points.
Canada illustrates the reversal. In 2024, a majority of Canadians viewed the US favourably, while only about two in 10 held a favourable view of China. By 2026, more Canadians viewed China favourably (44 percent) than the US (33 percent).
Likewise, respondents in several high-income countries, including Singapore, Spain, Greece, Italy and Canada, expressed more favourable views of China than of the US.
Middle-income countries, where Bangladesh is classified, started with a much narrower gap in China's favour. By 2026, however, China had opened a clearer lead there as favourable views of the US declined while those of China rose.
In nearly 90 percent of the middle-income countries surveyed, respondents expressed more favourable views of China than of the US. The list spans several regions, including Indonesia, Thailand, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Turkey, Mexico, South Africa, Nigeria, Kenya, Peru and Argentina.
Asked why China's standing in global public opinion has improved, Prof Tanzimuddin said Beijing is filling the vacuum left by a US increasingly seen as retreating from its commitments to human rights, social justice and freedom.
"China now has the financial capacity, a strong record of infrastructure development, and far more effective public diplomacy," he said.
He added that China has also become much more vocal on global justice issues, particularly Palestine, after long remaining reticent on such political questions.
