One-Third of Chinese Don’t Own Smartphones: Survey

Despite surpassing the U.S. to become the world’s largest smartphone market five years ago, China remains one of the less-penetrated countries in terms of smartphone ownership as a percentage of the overall population, according to a survey by the U.S.-based Pew Research Center.

Some 68% of Chinese reported owning smartphones, ranking the nation as the world’s 15th-most penetrated market for such ownership, according to the survey released earlier this month. The China data was collected from a 2016 survey, while data from other markets came from more recent sources.

South Korea led the list with a 94% smartphone penetration rate, followed by Israel and Australia at 83% and 82% respectively. The U.S. ranked eighth at 77%. Among developing markets, China had the fifth-highest penetration rate, behind Lebanon, Jordan, Chile and Turkey. Some 59% of respondents worldwide reported owning a smartphone, according to the survey.

China is the world’s largest smartphone market by unit sales, posting about 100 million shipments each quarter, or nearly a third of the world’s total. The country has risen to prominence so rapidly in part due to an explosion of local manufacturers led by Huawei, Oppo and Xiaomi, many producing relatively high-quality models with price tags as low as $100 and sometimes even lower.

That group has become aggressive exporters in the last five years, helping to ramp up smartphone ownership in other price-sensitive developing markets like India, where Xiaomi has become the top-selling brand. But the local explosion has also led to relative saturation in China, prompting smartphone sales to fall 5% last year and 16% in the first quarter of 2018.

China is one of the world’s most highly penetrated markets for overall cellphone ownership, with 98% of people surveyed reporting they owned either a smartphone or an older-feature phone, according to the Pew survey. Among other countries, only South Korea and Jordan had higher overall penetration rates, at 100% and 99% respectively.

Contact reporter Yang Ge (geyang@caixin.com)