Xiaomi becomes China’s top smartphone brand for first time in 2014, whips Samsung

Xiaomi just toppled Samsung’s statue. After years of being China’s number one smartphone brand, Samsung has now been deposed by Xiaomi. New data from IDC published today shows that Xiaomi’s 2014 market share of smartphone shipments in China rocketed to 12.5 percent, narrowly beating out Samsung’s 12.1 percent.

That’s very different from 2013, when Samsung led the way in China with 18.7 percent share while homegrown Xiaomi stood at 5.3 percent. It represents 186.5 percent year-on-year growth for Xiaomi compared to a bleak 22.4 percent drop for Samsung.

Former number two, Lenovo, once expressed ambitions to be the one to beat Samsung in China, but that hasn’t happened. Indeed, Lenovo was shoved down to third place in 2014 by the upstart Xiaomi. Huawei and Coolpad round out the 2014 top 5 rankings:

Apple not in top 5

Although Apple had a very strong end to 2014 thanks to its larger screen duo of iPhone 6 models, Apple is shunted down into the “others” group in terms of China market share for the whole year. Looking only at the final quarter of 2014, Apple was actually in second place in terms of shipments (12.3 percent share versus Xiaomi’s Q4 share of 13.7 percent). The popular iPhone 6 and 6 Plus could translate into a much higher place for Apple in 2015’s figures.

Xiaomi launched its first phone in 2011 and quickly gained traction by making budget smartphones that have surprisingly strong specifications. The Beijing-based firm claims it sold 61 million smartphones in 2014 and is aiming at around 100 million in 2015.

Now that Xiaomi is officially inaugurated as China’s smartphone king, it’s going to be tough for any other brand to wrest back the throne.

See: Smartphones in India and China: a tale of growth versus stagnation in 2014