BEIJING: Shoppers in China are getting rare discounts on iPhones as Apple faces growing competition from local brands.
The four-day promotion, which starts this Saturday (4 January), includes discounts of as much as 500 yuan ($68.50, £55.30) on some of the US technology giant’s newest handsets.
Chinese phone maker Huawei has also cut prices of its high-end mobile devices by as much as 20%.
The discounts come as consumers in China remain hesitant about spending because of the country’s economic challenges.
The offer covers Apple’s top models as well as older handsets and some other devices.
The biggest discount of 500 yuan will apply to Apple’s flagship iPhone 16 Pro, which has a starting price of 7,999 yuan, and the iPhone 16 Pro Max which currently costs 9,999 yuan.
The firm held a similar promotion in China last year ahead of the Lunar New Year holiday. This year, the festival starts at the end of January.
Apple is grappling with declining market share in China, the world’s largest smartphone market, where local manufacturers have intensified competition.
Huawei has emerged as a particularly strong challenger since its return to the premium segment in August 2023 with locally-made chipsets.
Huawei had
cut the prices of a variety of high-end devices, including mobile phones, by up to 3,000 yuan over the weekend on one of China’s leading e-commerce platforms.
Apple briefly fell out of China’s top five smartphone vendors in the second quarter of 2024 before recovering in the third quarter.
The U.S. company’s smartphone sales in China still slipped 0.3% during the third quarter from a year earlier, while Huawei’s sales
surged 42%, according to research firm IDC.
The Apple promotion also includes discounts of 200 to 300 yuan on older iPhone models, as well as other categories of products such as MacBook laptops and iPad tablets. Customers must use designated payment methods including WeChat Pay or Alipay to qualify for the discounts.
