Apple iPhone sales in China jump 52% ​​in April, data shows

BEIJING (Reuters) – Apple Inc’s smartphone shipments in China were 52% higher in April than a year ago, extending the recovery seen the previous month, according to data from a research firm affiliated with the Chinese government.

Shipments of foreign-brand phones in China rose 52 percent in April to 3.495 million units from 2.301 million a year earlier, data from the Chinese Academy of Information and Communications Technology (CAICT) showed on Tuesday.

Although the data does not explicitly mention Apple, the company is the dominant foreign phone maker in the smartphone-dominated Chinese market. This suggests that the increase in foreign brand shipments can be attributed to Apple’s performance.

The big increase follows poor performance earlier this year in the world’s biggest smartphone market, as the US tech giant faces increasing competition in the high-end market from local rivals such as Huawei.

Apple’s shipments in China increased 12% in March, marking a significant improvement from the first two months of 2024, when the company suffered a 37% drop in sales.

Sales could increase further in May as Apple launched an aggressive discount campaign this month on its official Tmall website in China, offering discounts of up to 2,300 yuan ($318) on select iPhone models.

The price reduction, double the discount offered in February, comes after Huawei last month introduced its new high-end smartphone series, the Pura 70, following the launch of the Mate 60 last August.

Huawei overtook Apple in the first quarter as the second smartphone supplier in China and is intensifying its marketing campaign by opening more of its own stores and adding more retail distributors. Huawei spin-off Honor takes first place.

Overall smartphone sales in China rose 25.5% to 22.7 million units in April, CAICT data showed.

(Reporting by Beijing newsroom; writing by Miyoung Kim; editing by Jason Neely and Philippa Fletcher)