Apple Leaps to the Second Spot In China's Smartphone Market
China’s smartphone market is slowing, but Apple continues to defy the trend.
• China’s smartphone market shipped 68.4 million units in Q3 2025, with YoY decline easing to -0.6%, signaling early stabilization.
• Apple posted positive YoY growth for the first time this year, climbing to second place in China’s market rankings.
• The iPhone 17 base model drove Apple’s rebound, appealing to cautious consumers amid tighter spending conditions.
The narrative of the Chinese smartphone market often centers on local dominance, with brands like Huawei, Vivo, and Xiaomi setting record-breaking sales figures. Yet, amid this domestic torrent, one constant stands out: the enduring and profitable presence of Apple.
Despite intense competition and geopolitical headwinds, China remains one of Apple’s most vital markets, accounting for a significant portion of its global revenue.
Even with a flood of Chinese brands in the market, Apple continues to hold its ground and, more importantly, its appeal. Despite being a dominant player, Apple has faced increasing challenges in retaining its market share.
China’s Smartphone Market Cools, But Not for Apple
To understand Apple’s position, it helps to look at the broader market. According to IDC, China’s smartphone industry shipped 68.4 million units in Q3 2025, with the overall year-over-year decline easing to -0.6% after a sharper 4.0% drop in Q2 – the first contraction after six straight quarters of growth. This back-to-back decline shows the market is still recalibrating after a long expansion cycle.
However, the resilience was notable, considering the third quarter is traditionally a low season characterized by fewer new product launches and more rational consumer spending due to the tightening of government subsidy policy.
With the market in an adjustment, competition among leading vendors has intensified, with shipment gaps between the top players continuing to narrow.
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Apple’s Rebound
Within this cooling environment, Apple managed to break the trend, posting year-over-year growth for the first time in 2025.
The cautious sentiment, driven by the "tightening of government subsidy policy" and other factors, turned consumers into "value seekers," benefiting Apple’s new product launches, specifically its base model iPhone 17.
As Will Wong, Senior Research Manager at IDC Asia/Pacific, noted, "Apple’s value-for-money base model iPhone 17 successfully captured this group of consumers, helping it to achieve slight growth and a higher ranking than the previous quarter."
With the iPhone 17, Apple managed to offer enough perceived value in its entry-level flagship to drive upgrades, which helped it to maintain volume while the higher-margin Pro models continue to capture the absolute premium segment.
This performance drove the rebound for the brand, propelling it to the second spot in the market, jumping from fifth place in the first two quarters and pushing it ahead of its major high-end rival, the resurgent Huawei.
However, Apple still trails the domestic leader, Vivo, which shipped 11.8 million units (17.3% share) and recorded a significant -7.8% YoY decline. Meanwhile, Huawei fell to third place, shipping only 10.4 million units (15.2% share), after seeing a marginal decline of -1.0%.
The data further emphasizes the cutthroat head-to-head competition among the local players, with Xiaomi (10.0 million units, 14.7% share) and the statistically tied OPPO (9.9 million units, 14.5% share, +0.4% YoY) and Honor (9.8 million units, 14.4% share, -2.1% YoY) another notable performer, all fighting fiercely within a narrow shipment band.
Why Apple Continues to Dominate in China
Beyond the quarterly numbers, Apple’s advantage in China lies in something deeper, a combination of pricing power, global brand strength, and cultural influence that local rivals have struggled to replicate.
To start, the tech giant dominates the nation’s premium smartphone segment, despite challenges from local rivals such as US-sanctioned Huawei. According to Counterpoint Research, it captured a 54% share of China’s smartphone market above the $600 price point in 2024.
Its global average selling price (ASP) stands at $919, far higher than overall industry averages pulled down by price wars among Chinese brands. That pricing power alone highlights the enormous revenue advantage Apple enjoys thanks to its ability to turn fewer shipments into far greater revenue.
Moreover, Apple’s strength in the country also leans on social capital. Its global branding power resonates with China’s status-conscious culture. Brand Finance’s 2025 ranking once again placed Apple as the world’s most valuable brand, worth $574.5 billion, and that global prestige feeds directly into its local success. This global status imbues the product with symbolic capital that Chinese consumers are willing to pay a premium for.
Even as domestic rivals have continued to pull ahead in terms of hardware specifications like battery capacity, camera performance, and, most crucially, AI-driven features, they have yet to eclipse the emotional value of the Apple logo.
For instance, Apple significantly trails in AI, with Siri often criticized as one of the top underperformers in the industry; however, things like the status symbol and the highly integrated Apple ecosystem, encompassing the iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch, and a suite of services like iCloud and the App Store, create tremendous customer lock-in. That "stickiness" is Apple's most potent defense against market-share erosion.
Ogbonda Chivumnovu
Staying in China While Building Beyond It
Beyond its product offerings, Apple is also executing a corporate strategy built on diplomacy and financial commitment to reinforce its image as a long-term, reliable partner in China’s economy. The company’s ongoing investments in local research, development, and supply chains, along with frequent high-profile visits by CEO Tim Cook, highlight this strategy.
That message has become especially important as Apple tries to balance its powerful retail presence in China with a major restructuring of its global supply chain. On one side, China remains one of Apple’s biggest markets, a key source of high-margin iPhone revenue. On the other hand, rising U.S.–China trade tensions have pushed Apple to reduce its manufacturing dependence on the country.
In recent years, the company has stepped up efforts to de-risk its production base, pursuing an aggressive “China Plus One” strategy. Industry reports show Apple accelerating iPhone assembly in India and Southeast Asia, diversifying away from China to ensure resilience. The plan is to shift nearly all iPhone production for the U.S. market to India, where output is expected to surpass 60 million units annually by 2026.
This massive realignment is designed to protect margins from tariffs, avoid political disruption, and maintain supply stability.
As such, the company is playing both sides of a delicate equation, maintaining its cultural and commercial influence with Chinese consumers, while methodically rerouting its manufacturing lifelines elsewhere.
Acquah Nana Yeboah
Conclusion
Ultimately, despite slowing demand and intensifying local competition, Apple continues to hold remarkable sway in the world’s most contested smartphone arena. Its success is rooted in brand strength, ecosystem loyalty, and an unmatched ability to command premium pricing even as the market shifts beneath it.
At the same time, China’s broader smartphone sector is entering a cautious recovery phase. Industry analysts expect modest growth in 2025 for their flagship models, beginning in mid-to-late September. The Singles’ Day online shopping festival is expected to be a key sales moment of the quarter. However, with consumer confidence still shaky, the event may not trigger a major surge in demand.
As Arthur Guo, Senior Research Analyst at IDC China, puts it: “Manufacturers must move beyond pricing tactics and focus on creating truly differentiated, competitive products to win consumer favor.”
In response, local vendors are leaning into design, battery innovation, and camera performance, while doubling down on AI-driven features to elevate user experience.
For Apple, the challenge is more complex. The company must sustain its high-margin momentum among Chinese consumers while accelerating efforts to diversify its supply chain away from the country.
