Smartphone shipments to the Chinese market totaled 71.8 million units in the second quarter of 2024, up 2.6% quarter-on-quarter and 14.4% from a year ago, but the volumes are expected to slip in the third quarter, but pick up in the fourth quarter, according to DIGITIMES Research's latest figures from the report covering China's smartphone market.
Looking into the second half of 2024, smartphone shipments to the Chinese market are estimated to see a single-digit sequential decline in the third quarter but a double-digit sequential growth in the fourth quarter of the year.
The top-5 smartphone brands in the China market from the largest to the smallest were Vivo, Oppo, Honor, Xiaomi, and Huawei in the second quarter of 2024. Compared to the previous quarter, Vivo, Oppo, and Honor retained their positions with Xiaomi rising from sixth place to fourth, Huawei falling from fourth to fifth, and Apple dropping out of the top five to sixth. The combined market share of the top-5 brands was 84.3%, up from the previous quarter's 82.2%.
Looking into the second half of 2024, smartphone shipments to the Chinese market are expected to dip below 70 million units in the third quarter of 2024, lacking a large-scale nationwide shopping promotion activity. However, the fourth-quarter shipments are estimated to see a sequential growth of 17.2% thanks to brand vendors' Singles' Day promotion campaigns.
For the whole year of 2024, smartphone shipments in the Chinese market are estimated to increase by 8.1% year-on-year to reach more than 288 million units in 2024. Compared to the previous estimate in April, this is an increase of around 6.7 million units, mainly due to better-than-expected sales from May to July and the recovery in demand in the second half of 2024.
However, it still represents a decrease of over 78.8 million units from the 367 million units shipped before the COVID-19 pandemic in 2019. China's estimated share of global smartphone shipments is 24.4% for 2024, the highest in the past six years except for 2019's 26.9%.
