Apple totally crushed it in China during the first few months of iPhone 12 5G sales

If you thought Apple’s iPhone 12 family performed well at the US box-office during its first few weeks of commercial availability, wait until you hear how many of these 5G-enabled bad boys were reportedly sold in China in Q4 2020.

The iPhone 11 series is a distant memory

The company’s market share sat at a relatively modest 11.8 percent, which the iPhone 12 lineup has apparently been able to boost to more than 20 percent of the huge local pie in Q4 2020. 

The name of the game is 5G

Clearly, this incredible (and incredibly sudden) success story has a lot to do with 5G, which is far more prevalent in China than many Western markets. More than 50 percent of all smartphones sold in the region during Q3 2020, for instance, came with a 5G connection, the vast majority of which were manufactured by local companies like Huawei, Vivo, and Oppo.

Speaking of, Apple’s Q4 2020 rise unsurprisingly came at the expense of those same Chinese brands, which dropped from over 90 percent to around 78 percent of shipments as they finally faced stiff 5G-capable Western competition at a number of different price points.