OPPO, Huawei, Vivo, Apple and Xiaomi are the top five smartphone makers in the fourth quarter of 2016 in China.
Shipping 44.9 million iPhones to China, Apple has beaten Xiaomi that shipped 41.5 million smartphones and slipped to fifth spot in Q4 2016, according to IDC.
Apple share dropped 23 percent from 58.4 million iPhones in 2015 and Xiaomi lost 36 percent from 64 million Mi phones.
Oppo shipped 78.4 million phones — more than double from 35.4 million in 2015. Huawei shipped 76 million phones, while Vivo managed to almost double its shipments, going from 35 million in 2015 to 69 million last year.
“Increased dependence on mobile apps has led to consumers to seek phone upgrades, thus helping drive the large growth in fourth quarter of 2016. In lower tiered cities, there was a similar demand by consumers, which Oppo and vivo met by aggressively pushing mid-range smartphones in these cities,” said Tay X iaohan, senior market analyst, IDC Asia/Pacific’s Client Devices team.
Despite the decline, IDC does not believe Chinese vendors have actually eaten away Apple’s market share. Most Apple users are expected to be holding out for the new iPhone that will be launched this year, and that will help the brand to see a growth in 2017.
Apple’s 10-year anniversary iPhone will likely attract some of the high-end Android users in China to convert to an iPhone.
IDC said the smartphone market in China saw 19 percent growth and 17 percent quarter-on-quarter growth in the fourth quarter of 2016. In 2016, the market grew by 9 percent with top Chinese smartphone vendors taking up a larger share of the market.
At present, out of the top three Chinese vendors in China, Huawei is the most successful with half of its shipments coming from markets outside China in fourth quarter of 2016.
