Huawei just pulled off something most people probably didn’t expect—maybe not even inside Huawei. After spending years boxed in by U.S. sanctions and largely written off as a fading giant, the company is back at the top of China’s smartphone market. Q2 2025 numbers from IDC show Huawei reclaimed the No. 1 spot, grabbing an 18% share of shipments.
That’s not a small win. It’s a reshuffling of a market that rarely sees this kind of reversal.
In raw numbers, Huawei shipped over 12 million units, mostly thanks to the Pura 80 Ultra. It’s a flagship with a strong camera game and, more importantly, it signals something else: Huawei’s tightening grip on homegrown chip development. Whether that tech is fully competitive is still up for debate, but clearly it’s working well enough to push volume.
The rest of the market? Shifting. Vivo, which had been sitting comfortably in first, fell by more than 10%, landing in second. Oppo and Xiaomi followed. And Apple—now fifth—has to be feeling the pressure. The iPhone still sells, obviously, but sentiment has shifted. It’s not just geopolitics (though that’s a factor); it’s also local pride and the fact that domestic phones are getting good. Really good.
But here’s the thing: momentum like this isn’t guaranteed. Huawei’s success this quarter could be the result of timing, a fresh release cycle, or even political tailwinds. The rest of 2025 is packed with flagship launches across the board. If Huawei wants to hold the crown, it has to keep delivering—on hardware, on chips, on price.
Still, this moment matters. Huawei didn’t just climb back. It forced a rethink. What was once assumed to be a slow, terminal decline is suddenly a very live, very competitive fight for dominance in the world’s biggest smartphone market.
