Market research firm Canalys today announced its annual shipment data for the Chinese smartphone market for 2018. The data shows that the Chinese market experienced the most dramatic decline in shipment in its entire history. The industry recorded an estimated gross shipment of 396 million units, shrinking the overall market size to the level before 2014.
The data shows the top five mobile phone manufacturers still continue to grow, obviously at the detriment of smaller OEMs. Their combined market share grew significantly from 73% in 2017 to 88% in 2018. Despite the decline, Huawei still ranked number one in market share with an estimated 15% increase in shipment YoY. Another company whose shipments increased tremendously is Vivo with a 9% growth compared to 2017. OPPO still maintained its second spot but the gap between OPPO and Vivo shrunk from 10 million to 2 million units. Vivo’s rise is strongly connected to the company’s innovative products such as the Vivo NEX etc.
Read Also: Redmi X leaked poster hints February 15 launch
Xiaomi came in at the fourth spot with a slight increase in its market share from last year. While Apple is the only international brand still making a mark in the Chinese market but with a decline in its market share. Apple’s gross shipments fell for the third consecutive year and this is linked to the rise of Chinese brands who offer quality flagship phones at almost half the price of Apple’s own flagships.
(via)
