Apple’s Q3 Chinese smartphone sales decline, Huawei’s soaring

Apple rises to second place with 15.6% market share [File]
|Photo provided by: Reuters

Apple’s iPhone sales in China fell 0.3% as competition intensified in the world’s biggest smartphone market, while rival Huawei’s sales surged 42% in the third quarter of 2024.

According to data released by researcher IDC on Friday, Apple came in second with a market share of 15.6%, down 0.5 points from a year ago, while Huawei rose 4.2 points to take third place with 15.3%.

Vivo, which mainly sells cheap mobile phones, was the top vendor with a market share of 18.6%. The contrasting performance follows Huawei’s return to the premium segment last year with the Mate 60 series, which analysts say is powered by domestically produced chips. The Chinese tech giant further challenged Apple’s position with its latest model, the Pura 70, released earlier this year.

Apple faces further headwinds in China, including restrictions on iPhone use by some government agencies.

The US tech giant has since responded with multiple discount campaigns to boost sales. Third-quarter results were partially contributed by the new iPhone 16, which was released on September 20th.

On the same day, Huawei launched a competing product, a tri-fold phone. The new iPhone is off to a strong start in China, with sales up 20% in the first three weeks after its release compared to the 2023 model, separate data from researcher Counterpoint has revealed.

“With its annual new product launches, Apple gained a 15.6% market share and returned to the top five in China’s market rankings,” IDC said.

“With the subsequent increase in promotions in the market and the launch of Apple Vision Pro, the market demand for the iPhone 16 series is expected to gradually materialize in the future.”

Overall, smartphone sales in China increased by 3.2% to 68.78 million units in the third quarter.