Mainland China’s PC shipments rose 12% in Q2 2025, but a slowdown is expected in H2

The latest data from Canalys, part of Omdia, shows that the Mainland China PC market (excluding tablets) grew by 12% in Q2 2025, to 10.2 million units. Both consumer and commercial PC demand were healthy, with shipments to each segment rising 13% and 12%, respectively. This uplift was driven by ongoing consumer subsidies and strong procurement activity from state-owned enterprises (SOEs) and the government. Meanwhile, tablet shipments grew 18% year on year, totaling 9.1 million units in the quarter. Future forecasts indicate Mainland China’s PC shipments will grow 2% in 2025 and 3% in 2026, while tablets are expected to rise 8% in 2025 and decline 9% in 2026.

“Government subsidies for device purchases remain a big factor in vendors’ success, with Apple being a significant beneficiary in Q2 2025,” said Emma Xu, Senior Analyst at Canalys, part of Omdia. “Effective discounting on the already more competitively priced new MacBook Air model drove significant uptake in Mainland China. On top of that, competition among upstream CPU vendors has also fueled device upgrades, with attractively priced PC products entering the market. AMD has released its new Ryzen AI series of AI PC chips, as well as the latest Radeon RX 9060 GPU and Ryzen 9000 Series processors, all priced competitively against equivalents from other vendors. Both Intel and AMD also offered strong discounts on their previous-generation products in Q2 2025, driving the average selling price of PCs down sequentially in the quarter, despite a wave of new product announcements from vendors.”

“AI-capable PCs accounted for 28% of total PC shipments in Mainland China in Q2 2025, indicating a growing preference for upgraded hardware capabilities among consumers and businesses,” said Xu. China’s homegrown AI ecosystem is continuing to develop rapidly—from upstream AI chips, such as Cambricon and Ascend, which are largely deployed by large enterprises and cloud vendors, to the software and hardware platforms at the edge, including UOS and HarmonyOS. The Chinese government announced the AI Plus Action Plan in August 2025, setting targets for 70% adoption of AI devices and agents by 2027, 90% adoption of AI software and applications by 2030, and for Chinese society to broadly enter the AI era by 2035. “This will likely accelerate local AI infrastructure development and adoption of edge devices, including AI-capable PCs, as well as the commercialization of AI agents and assistants deployed on these devices in the coming years,” added Xu.

China’s PC market is expected to grow 2% year on year in 2025 and 3% in 2026, boosted by consumer subsidies and refresh cycle momentum from SOEs and government procurement. According to Canalys (part of Omdia) forecast, AI-capable PC adoption is expected to accelerate, accounting for 34% of shipments in 2025 and 52% in 2026. By the end of 2029, approximately 107 million AI-capable PCs are expected to have shipped in Greater China, establishing a substantial installed base for AI application usage.

For more information, please contact:

Emma Xu: emma.xu@informa.com

About the PC Horizon service

The worldwide PC Horizon service from Canalys (part of Omdia) provides quarterly updated shipment data to help with accurate market sizing, competitive analysis and identifying growth opportunities. Canalys PC shipment data is granular, guided by a strict methodology, and is broken down by market, vendor and channel, as well as additional splits, such as GPU, CPU, storage and memory. In addition, quarterly forecasts are published to help better understand the future trajectory and changing landscape of the PC industry.

About Canalys

Canalys, now part of Omdia, is a leading global technology market analyst firm with a distinct channel focus. We strive to guide clients on the future of the technology industry and to think beyond the business models of the past. We’ve delivered market analysis and custom solutions to technology vendors worldwide for over 25 years. Our research covers emerging, enterprise, mobile and smart technologies. Understanding channels is at the heart of everything we do. Our insightful reports, data and forecasts inform our clients’ strategies, while the Canalys Forums and Candefero online community give the channel feedback opportunities. We stake our reputation on the quality of our data, our innovative use of technology and our high level of customer service.

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