Mr. Biden and Mr. Xi spoke by phone on Sept. 9, but the two leaders have not met in person since Mr. Biden’s inauguration. The Chinese leader has not left his country for nearly two years, out of concern with the coronavirus pandemic.
China has been at the forefront of the Biden administration’s foreign policy.
Senior American officials said on Friday that Mr. Biden was efforts on ensuring that the United States could compete with China over the long run. They pointed to the passage this month of the bipartisan infrastructure bill as evidence that the administration was serious about not falling behind.
The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity to preview the diplomatic conversations, said the president would make clear that the United States was ready to engage in stiff competition, but did not want conflict with China and was eager to cooperate in areas where the interests of the two countries were aligned.
Those areas are likely to include discussions of efforts to limit nuclear proliferation and counter global warming.
But the meeting between Mr. Biden and Mr. Xi could also be a tense one, as the two leaders deal with more contentious issues, including China’s military buildup in the South China Sea, Chinese hacking of corporate and government computer systems in the United States, human rights violations by the Chinese government, and the ongoing conflict between China and Taiwan.