This study explores the impact of artificial intelligence (AI) adoption on managerial climate change attention in Chinese listed firms from 2011 to 2023. The results reveal that AI adoption has a positive and significant effect on managerial climate change attention. Furthermore, this relationship is more pronounced among firms that comply with local environmental and sustainability regulations, rather than global reporting initiatives, as well as among firms operating in regions with higher environmental enforcement intensity, privately owned firms, and firms in heavily polluting industries. These findings are robust to alternative measures of AI adoption, two-stage Heckman tests, two-step Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) estimation, propensity score matching, and entropy balancing. The study provides important policy implications by highlighting the role of AI in strengthening firms’ environmental governance and in aligning corporate strategies with institutional pressures on climate responsibility.