Huawei HarmonyOS expands lead over iOS in China

Huawei has achieved a new milestone in mobile operating system segment with HarmonyOS expanding its lead over iOS in China in the latest market share report by Counterpoint Research. The report compiles the past two year of data from the Global and Chinese mobile OS industry.

The global market is dominated by Android with 74 percent market share, which continue to fluctuate since the first quarter of 2023. On the other hand, iOS has acquired more share in the fourth quarter of 2024.

Meanwhile, HarmonyOS’s stands at third spot and its market share remained flat through 2024. However, these figures aren’t the same for the Chinese OS industry.

In China, Android dominates at 64% market share in Q4 2024, iOS at 17% but HarmonyOS now has 19% shares. This change keeps the Huawei developed OS on the second place.

“Harmony OS remained ahead of Apple’s iOS for the fourth consecutive quarter. The smartphone subsidies in China were beneficial to local OEMs and will likely result in further growth of Harmony OS.” wrote CounterPoint Research in a statement.

Source – Counterpoint Research

HarmonyOS is Huawei’s home-grown operating system designed for various platforms including smartphone, tablets, smart wearables, smart TVs, smart driving solutions and third party device makers.

Since unveiling in 2019, it has received various updates and improvements for a better mobile software user experience.

Huawei’s approach with HarmonyOS NEXT is an example of new advancement. It no longer aligns with Android AOSP thanks to the new native app support. With over two years of collaboration with the Chinese tech and IT industry, Huawei has brought thousands of essential native apps to HarmonyOS.

The OS share increase are contributed by Huawei’s smartphone sales. The researcher revealed that the Huawei climbed to the top spot during Q4 2024 with 18.1% market share in the home ground.

This was the first time when the Chinese tech maker regained strong hold in China after US ban five years ago. Its sales are increased 15.5% over 2023 featuring Nova 13 and Mate 70 series.

(source)