Lower-tier Chinese cities (tier-4 and lower) saw the largest growth of 21.7% in active mobile devices in Q1 2020. More users in the above 40 years old age group (14% growth) were observed.

Check out the updated Mobile Apps Overview 2020 here including top mobile app categories by the total number of apps, usage time, total users. And, check out the top growing mobile app categories by total new users, city tiers, age groups,

The Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) issued a warning that China’s population could start to shrink as soon as 2027 if its fertility rate remains at the current level of about 1.6. According to Singapore media Channel NewsAsia, China’s population is set to reach a peak of 1.442 billion in 2029 and start a long period of “unstoppable” decline in 2030.

In 2018, the number of births was 15.23 million with a birth rate of 10.94 per thousand. The number of deaths was 9.93 million with a death rate of 7.13 per thousand. The natural growth rate was 3.81 per thousand.

Regarding gender, the male population was 713.51 million, and the female population was 681.87 million. The sex ratio of the total population was 104.64 (the female is 100).

Concerning age composition, the population at the working age of 16-59 was 897.29 million, accounting for 64.3% of the total population. People aged 60 and over was 249.49 million, accounting for 17.9% of the total, 166.58 million of which aged 65 and over, accounting for 11.9% of the total.

Concerning urban-rural structure, the permanent residents in urban areas were 831.37 million, an increase of 17.90 million over that at the end of last year; and the permanent residents in rural areas were 564.01 million, a decrease of 12.60 million.

The proportion of the urban population to the total population (urbanization rate) was 59.58%, 1.06 percentage points higher than that at the end of 2017.

The population who reside in areas other than their household registration and have been away from there for over six months reached 286 million, which was 4.50 million less than that at the end of 2017. Specifically, the floating population stood at 241 million, 3.78 million less than that at the end of 2017.

Insights of China internet users in lower-tier cities

Over three-quarters of China internet users trust news and information from traditional media in 2016 compared with 70% in 2015 according to a research by Edelman.

Owned media is the least trusted online news source, followed by social media in China.

Weibo was the most active social mobile app in China in 2015 with high user monthly coverage rate and long usage time according to TrustData. Monthly active users of Weibo was 222 million as of September 2015 according to Tencent. Read more…

Year 2015 is almost over; let’s recall some of the top keywords for China internet that got so much attention in the world: outbound tourism, cross-border online shopping, mobile, WeChat, Tmall…

Here are the most popular CIW articles in 2015:

1. Baidu, Sogou among Top 5 Biggest Search Engines in the World. eMarketer estimated that in 2015, the total spend of digital advertising in the world will exceed US$170.85 billion according to its report released on 31 March 2015. Baidu and Sohu ranked the second and fourth respectively in the top 5 biggest search engines by revenue in 2014.

Also read: China Search Engine Market Share, and China’s Mobile Search Market

2. China E-commerce Market Overview. In Q1 2015, the total transaction value of China e-commerce market exceeded RMB3.48 trillion (USD$567.49 billion) with an increase of 10.1% YoY and 23.8% QoQ. In accordance with China B2B market and online shopping market in Q1 2015, e-commerce market had slowed its YoY growth. Besides, it is now evolving into a new stage.

• China Online Cosmetics Market Overview
• China Online Shopping Accounted for over 10% of Total Retail
• 10 Charts to Tell You Almost Everything About Alibaba Group
• Stats of Top Selling Brands on Taobao/Tmall in 18 Categories in Sep 2014
• How Japanese AV Idol Sora Aoi Sells on China Social Media
• China Top 100 E-Commerce Companies in Q3 2015

3. Wechat Launched Wechat Contacts App Offering Free Calls.  Wechat released a Wechat Contacts app as an enhancement to smartphones’ existing contacts.

• How Wechat Users Search For Public Accounts
• China Social Media Users Insights in 2015
• WeChat, Weibo or Alipay? Who Won Hongbao War in 2015?
• WeChat & Weibo Users Most Active Social Shoppers in the World
• Wechat 5.0 Public Account Operation Guide
• 20 Charts on WeChat Shopping Market
• How WeChat Drives Viral Marketing of Local Specialities
• The Value of WeChat Official Accounts
• WeChat to Launch Themed Campaign on China Children’s Day
• WeChat Daily Active Users Reached 570 Mln in Sep 2015

3.  China B2B E-commerce Market in Q1 2015. China B2B e-commerce market reached RMB 5.48 billion (USD 883 million) in Q1 2015, an decrease of 1.6% QoQ according to Analysis International.

4. China Female Online Shopper Insights 2015. Shoes and bags accounted for 27.3% of all the categories of online products, being the best selling product category. Cosmetics ranked the third, which showed female online shopping is booming in China.

5. China Mobile Social Networking Users to Reach 335.9 Mln in 2015. The number will continue grow and by 2019, users will exceed 480.4 million, representing 34.8% of total population.

6. 80% China’s Mobile Users Rooted Smartphones in 2014 Compared with traditional channels to download ROM, ROM official website is more resourceful and categorized. 36.4% respondents would like to download on official websites in 2014. However, there were fewer smartphone users downloading ROM from online communities.

• The Secrets Of Xiaomi Marketing Success in China
• China Top 100 Mobile Apps in July 2015
• 70% App Downloads From Mobile App Stores in China
• China Mobile Internet Insights in H1 2015

7.  Rise of the China Outbound Tourism. China outbound tourists on average spent RMB 20,000 (US$3,252) during travel per person and shopping is an important part of their spend in oversea trips (57.8%).

• China Tourists Travel Intention Study 2015
• Chinese Luxury Traveler Insights 2015
• China, the Largest Outbound Tourism Market in 3 Consecutive years
• China to Be the Largest Business Travel Market Worldwide in 2016
• China Online Accommodation Booking Market in Q3 2015
• China Online Travel Market Overview in Q3 2015

Last but not least, we wish you a Happy New Year with the hope that you will have many blessings in the year to come!

China’s mobile internet users reached 901 million as of September of 2015 according to China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. The mobile e-mail users in China have reached 250 million based on the latest report of WPS.

64% e-mail users are used to use e-mail on desktop computers. However, by the further expansion of the mobile internet and smartphones, more people tend to use mobile phones to contact with friends, read news and even work that 56% e-mail users prefer utilizing mobile mailbox every day.

Business mailbox is one of the major reasons of people to open e-mail every day. Business e-mail users in China receive an average of 20 e-mails and send 2 to 3 e-mails every day. Enterprise e-mail users are mainly companies operating the internet, finance, sales and the like as well as some large state-owned enterprises. Mobile business mailbox users almost spend one-fourth of their working hours on mobile mailbox apps.

College students and white collars are major users of personal e-mails in China. In general, a majority of private mailbox users will open once to twice every day although they have two or even more e-mail accounts. College students and white collars who need to apply for jobs or change jobs receive an average of ten e-mails every day and six from online recruitment websites.

Men accounts for 70% of mobile e-mail users and women only 30%. Female mobile e-mail users usually manage e-mails during 9am to 10am while male users are used to handling e-mails at night.

More than 20% users will read through the e-mails to search for news and the average usage time has increased by 50% according to WPS. 15% users check their mailboxes in the subway, 10% will open the mobile e-mail accounts before going to sleep, and 9% even use the mobile apps in the bathroom.

Men aged from 25 to 35 years old play the dominant role among mobile e-mail users. The post-70s don’t use mobile e-mails very often. Only the post-90s who will apply for jobs use mailboxes every day. The post-70s prefer to use 163 Email accounts and Yahoo Email. The post-80s like to use 163 Email, QQ Email, and Gmail. The post-90s are more likely to use QQ Email and Gmail. Mobile mailboxes are most popular in Guangdong, Beijing, Zhejiang, Shanghai, and Liaoning. QQ Email, 163 Email, Sina Mail, Gmail and Hotmail are popular private mailboxes:

• QQ Postbox: mainly for students, white collars and people not using the internet too much, mostly for entertainment and everyday communication;
• 163 Postbox & Sina Mail: mainly for individual and business contacts;
• Gmail: users are more likely proficient in networking and computer applications;
• Hotmail: mainly for MSN white-collars.

Also read: China’s Mobile Internet Insights Q1-Q3 2015

China “exports” the most number of students studying overseas in the world according to a UNSCO’s report. China and India, which have the most people in the world, also have the most students studying overseas in 2012.

In 2012, Chinese overseas students reached 694,400, ranking the top in the world, followed by India and South Korea with 189,500 and 123,700 overseas students respectively.

Also read: China Tourists Travel Intention Study 2015

From January to March in 2015, 60.97% China internet users visited female fashion websites directly. Male visitors accounted for 59.21% and visitors who are between 30 years old and 40 years old represented 42.5% according to Baidu’s research.

Most of the visitors visited female fashion websites directly from Jan to Mar in 2015, representing 60.97%.

Also read: China Navigation Websites Study

Internet is now the important method for Chinese people to social and for information to spread. According to the report released by Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, over 90% China urban households own more than one network device in 2014.

The report shows that 93.8% China urban households own more than one network device and 53.94% respondents were engaged in spreading information online.

In 2018, China internet’s penetration will exceed 90%. eMarketer estimates that by 2018, China internet female and male users will be about half to half which indicates female internet users’ penetration rate will be much high since there are fewer female in China.

GlobalWebIndex data showed that 65% of netizen worldwide accessed internet via mobile phone, while the percentage was even higher in specific country-China had 83% mobile internet penetration with approximately 383 million netizens.

Also read: Chinese Female Internet Users Insight

Navigation websites are similar to directory websites, listing websites by categories and making it easier for users to find what they need. It’s set as homepage or entry page to internet access by many internet users in China. Let’s take a look at some insights of navigation websites in China.

In July 2014, navigation websites had daily user coverage of 150 million with growth rate of 56.3%, ranking the most popular online application in China according to data from iResearch.

China top 3 navigation websites by MAUs in October were Hao.360.cn, Hao123.cn and 123.Sougou.com according to data from EnfoDesk.

Page views of Hao123.cn exceeded 2,909 million in October, ranking top among China navigation websites, followed by Hao.360.cn and 2345.com.

Besides, Hao123.cn had longest visiting time among China navigation websites in October.

In terms of visits, Hao.360.cn had the most visits among China navigation websites, followed by Hao123.cn and 2345.com in October 2014.

Most Chinese people who use navigation service on the internet were satisfied with popular navigation websites in China according to research of EnfoDesk.

Male users accounted for 74.4% of total navigation website users in China.

Users whose income were between 2,000 and 3,999 yuan accounted for 27.86% of total users, which were the major ones in October 2014.

China navigation website users who were in east China represented 36.62% of total users, followed by north and south China.

Users who had bachelor degree used navigation websites more than other users with different education background in October 2014.

China navigation website users favored social news on desktop, which accounted for 80.13%.

Leisure games accounted for 63.4% of all the favored games by Chinese people, ranking top, followed by role play and chess & cards games.

Online videos like movie, hot trend video and TV drama were the most popular ones favored by Chinese users in 2014.

Hao123.cn, Hao.360.cn and 2345.com are known by Chinese people and they visited these navigation websites within half a year in 2014.

Chinese users tend to visit navigation website with installed browser, which represented 60.73% in 2014.

Clothing, bags & luggage, digital product and book & video were top 3 categories of products purchased via navigation websites by Chinese users on desktop in 2014.

Also read: China Top Automobile Websites in Q3 2014

China is the biggest internet market in the world by penetration rate, estimated by eMarketer. In 2018, China internet’s penetration will exceed 90%.

In 2014, China sex ratio among internet users are 126 men to every 100 women according to data of eMarketer. It estimates that by 2018, China internet female and male users will be about half to half which indicates female internet users’ penetration rate will be much high since there are fewer female in China. 

75% of Chinese families’ consumption is decided by women and their influence is extended to internet and mobile internet. Chinese female internet users are showing great potential nowadays.

The internet penetration rate among China’s young adults is relatively high in 2014. 80% of China internet users who are between 18 and 34 years old access internet every month. The data also shows the old who are over 60 years old also use internet a lot in China nowadays. It is estimated that the penetration among all age groups will all increase through 2018.

In China rural areas, the internet penetration rate is rising. As of December 2013, internet users in rural China were 177 million; and 149 million users were mobile Internet users. The internet usage with mobile phone accounted for 84.6% in rural China, which had 5% higher than in cities.

Also read: China Mobile Internet Statistics 2014

China internet users will exceed 643.6 million by end of 2014, estimated by eMarketer. The penetration is high among young adults. 80% of China internet users between 18 to 34 years old use internet every month.

China internet users an average own 1.9 devices per person.

Most internet users in China go online everyday. This is true across all age ranges, with 64% of Internet users 55 or older coming online everyday.

Smartphone internet users in China use their smartphones for a range of everyday activities.

52% of Chinese respondents made their last clothing/ footwear purchase online – one of the highest rates the world. The 3 most popular online shopping news apps were Meilishuo, Mogujie and Koudai in September.

iResearch estimates China mobile shopping market is going to exceed RMB800 billion (US$129.7 billion) this year, 30% of total total online shopping transactions.

59% of respondents in China researched their last purchase both online and offline.

1 in 3 of Chinese smartphone users used their device during their last purchase.

Chinese respondents frequently research online and then buy offline – this is particularly the case for car insurance and TV sets.

Most Chinese respondents watch online video to be entertained or inspired. In Q3 2014, China online video market reached RMB6.82 billion (US$1.11 billion) with increase of 9.3% QoQ, and it is still showing great power in China.

1 in 3 respondents in China watched their last online video with someone else. This was usually their partner.

55% of Chinese respondents were fully focused on the last online video they watched.

Online video is often watched while commuting/ travelling in China.

Also read: China Mobile Internet Market in Q3 2014

In 2013, Jingdong’s total revenue exceeded RMB69.34 billion ($11.28 billion) and its net profit was RMB6.86 billion ($1.11 billion) with net profit rate of 9.9%. Jingdong ranked top in China Internet enterprises by revenue, followed by Tencent and Alibaba in 2013.

Jingdong.com, one of the most popular online shopping website in China. It had approximately 38,000 merchants on its online marketplace as of June 30, 2014 and a total of 62,061 full-time employees as of July 31, 2014.

Tencent, one of most successful Internet enterprise that featured with gaming products and social applications. Instant Messaging client QQ and mobile app WeChat are the flagship products of Tencent. See more about Tencent: Whitepaper: The Story of Rise of Tencent Empire

Alibaba Group is the largest online and mobile commerce company in the world in terms of gross merchandise volume (GMV) in 2013, according to the IDC GMV Report. See its investment timeline: here.

Here is the list for China Top 100 Internet Enterprises in 2013:

Read more: How Wechat Moments Are Used As Sales Channel in China

75% of Chinese families’ consumption is decided by women and their influence is extended to internet and mobile internet. In 2012, purchase by female Internet users accounted for 50% of total online shopping transaction value ($1,324.28 billion). They accounted for over 60% of total users on comprehensive goods e-commerce platform, and 80%-90% on cosmetics e-commerce platform, and over 70% on group buying platform.

The number of China female Internet users was 280 million as of 30 June 2014 , and the total number of Internet users exceeded 632 million according to the report of CNNIC.

Most of Chinese female mobile Internet users have monthly income between RMB1,000 and RMB3,000 in 2011. With the popularity of mobile payment, China female Internet users’ online shopping spend is expected to increase.

The total number of China mobile Internet users reached 857 million which accounted for 68.2% of total mobile phone users (1.256 billion) till May 2014 according to MIIT.

Chinese female mobile Internet users who are between 19 to 35 years old accounted for 56% of the total Internet users and they were major users in China online shopping market according to data from EnfoDesk.

Students accounted for 29.2% of total Chinese female Internet users and workers accounted for 15.2%. Females’ shopping willingness is easy to stimulate and they could be addicted to online shopping.

Also read: 13 Charts of China Mobile Internet User Insights

Purchasing foreign products nowadays shows a rising trend in Chinese market. Foreign products, commonly perceived as being with good quality, are often more expensive in China than in the west. 

One Haagen-Dazs is sold at USD14.29 in China, while it costs USD4.87 overseas. But why are foreign products more expensive in China? The pricing of an exported product are determined by several factors: the import tax, cost, sales channels, brand processing strategy and so on.

The import tax affects the final price of exported products but it may not be so decisive. Take the pricing of “Coach” handbag as an example: it is priced at USD617 in China, USD417 in HK but USD294 in US.

US price (294)+ Tariff (10%)+ VAT (17%) + logistcis”=US$406

We can figure out $406 is much lower than the actual price of $617 in China. In China, the import tax on imported goods are generally between 10% to 20%, lower than some countries such as India; however, it’s even cheaper in India than it is in China.

When it comes to the cost of the foreign products, labour cost in developed countries could be a factor but during recent years, some parts of production lines have transferred from local to the developing countries with cheap labor, such as China, India, Vietnam etc., which, in other words, has lowed the cost of products instead.

You may not know most of the coffee beans consumed at Starbucks are sourced in Yunnan Province, China. Starbucks has primary processing factory in Yunnan, which can control the cost of  coffee bean within USD0.06 for each cup. However, with lower cost, why is the price higher in China?

Let’s take a look at the sales channels. According to some friends in the retailing industry, the more well-known brand can often get a lower rent.

Starbucks, ZARA, Levi’s, Coach, CK, NIKE, Haagen-Dazs… all achieved great success and have a good market share in China. The president of MONT BLANC in China once said:

we sell one bag for USD4,873 in China; though the government cut tariff by 20%, the bag is still USD4,873. We make profit even from tariff.

There is a solid reason of higher pricing adopted by many well known premium brands in China as it’s still true among many Chinese consumers’ perception: high pricing = premium quality.

A new report from research and advisory firm Gartner identifies the top 10 strategic technology trends that CIOs in China should consider in order to pursue business growth and remain competitive throughout the digital era.

The top 10 technology trends highlight the current state of technology adoption in China, as well as the maturity and traction of the technologies. Organizations in China are expected to spend $140.6 billion (RMB 854 billion) on technology products and services in 2014, according to Gartner’s latest forecast.

Gartner defines a strategic technology as one with the potential for significant impact on the enterprise in the next three years. Factors that denote significant impact include a high potential for disruption to IT or the business, the need for a major dollar investment, or the risk of being late to adopt. A strategic technology may be an existing technology that has matured and/or become suitable for a wider range of uses, or an emerging technology that offers an opportunity for strategic business advantage.

China is a large IT market full of potential and competiveness,

said Amy Teng, principal research analyst at Gartner.

China’s technology trends align with other regions worldwide – but with some variations because of unique market conditions. Enterprises in China are in various stages of adoption, with some mature organizations being early adopters of technology and some still in the early stages of evaluation.

“Although the top 10 technologies that Chinese companies should factor into their strategic planning processes are defined here, this does not necessarily mean investment in all of the listed technologies is essential,” said Ms. Teng.

However, companies should look to make deliberate decisions about each of them during the next two years.”

The top ten strategic technology trends for China in 2014 include:

Mobile Device Diversity and Management

The rapid adoption of BYOD makes enterprise mobility strategies more complex and challenging. Through 2018, the growing variety of devices, computing styles, user contexts and interaction paradigms will make managing this diversity a priority strategic initiative for enterprises CIOs. In China, CIOs experience an even more serious situation because the region exhibits a faster device replacement cycle due to the popularity of low-tier smartphones. Another distinct differentiation is created by the culture of Chinese employees, who tend to work longer hours and increasingly mix work with life, a trend that extends to their digital “self.”

Mobile Apps and Applications

Mobile apps and applications will continue to grow in 2014 and there is no sign of that trend slowing down, driven by the strong demand for mobile services that have moved beyond the early stage of enabling information and content access to bringing new capabilities to consumers and businesses. With the popularity of using mobile devices to explore the physical world, Chinese companies are employing new interactive technologies such as quick response (QR) code, audio, augmented reality, gesture and Near Field Communication (NFC) with QR code being the most popular one. Enterprises are gearing up efforts on mobile applications and early adopters, including banks and airlines, have introduced mobile apps for consumers or employees, such as mobile banking, self-check-in services and in-cabin services.

Social Commerce

Social commerce is the use of social networks and social media to support sales transactions. China is well ahead of western counterparts by almost five years in successfully deploying all use cases of social commerce. The most common use case for social commerce in the U.S. and Europe is product reviews with limited success in social shopping and social network commerce. China proves contrary with social network commerce dominating the market. Tencent QQ, Tencent WeChat and Sina Weibo are the three major social networks in China that enterprises leverage to drive social commerce.

Internet of Everything

Gartner forecasts that the Internet of Things (IoT) will include 26 billion units installed by 2020 and related IoT product and service suppliers will generate incremental revenue exceeding $300 billion, mostly in services, in 2020. China’s leaders have provided support and encouragement to bring China to the forefront of IoT development. A number of key policies have been developed to target IoT innovation, with nine areas being identified as the applications areas that the government will invest in. These are: smart industrial, smart logistics, smart agriculture, smart grid, intelligent medical, smart household, intelligent transportation, smart city security and management, and smart environment protection.

Hybrid cloud and IT as a Service Broker

Hybrid IT is the mission and the operational model for IT in a cloud computing world. As more cloud computing services emerge, the value of a trusted broker for the enterprise will increase. This broker will ensure maximum efficiency and effectiveness in provider selection, governance, payment, integration, management, security and compliance. Most Chinese enterprises have started leveraging cloud computing and their users are increasingly accepting the new modes of working. However, for reasons both external and internal, Chinese enterprises are yet to form successful Hybrid IT environments. Nevertheless Gartner expects that the demand for hybrid solutions will intensify over the next three years, forcing companies in China to deploy technologies to secure, manage and govern solutions across a hybrid architecture.

Cloud/Client Architecture

The high growth in smartphone sales and the thriving mobile apps ecosystem coupled with a broad choice of devices and brands have created a seedbed for enterprises to adopt a new cloud/client applications model in China. The availability of 4G telecom services and a few emerging public cloud services will further fuel the development of mobile services and change of client/cloud architecture in imminent future. CIOs and enterprises IT will need to think about how they can provide a unified and seamless integrated users experience across mobile endpoint devices and re-gain the software engineering best practices to balance among monolithic, modular, object- and service-oriented approaches. Fortunately, Chinese enterprises have relatively less legacy to abandon when adopting this new model.

The Era of Personal Cloud

Users in China are increasingly adopting various personal cloud services such as Tudou for streaming video, WeChat for social network, Qzone for cloud storage and data synchronization across devices and platforms. However, the major difference between personal cloud service in China and most other mature markets is the current revenue model. Most of the personal cloud services provided in China are currently free to customers – even the streaming video services. This looks set to change as Chinese businesses look increasingly at how they can develop their services over the personal cloud to their employees, business partners or customers to improve their operations and expand revenue.

Software-Defined Anything

Software-defined anything (SDx) decouples the IT services (such as computing, networking, security, and storage) from the hardware underneath, hence extending the concept of virtualization into a new level in which all data center resources are abstracted, pooled and automatically managed. The core components of SDx in data centers include compute virtualization, software-defined networks (SDNs), and software-defined storage (SDS). In China, SDN is rising very fast in Type A enterprises, as well as in large e-commerce and cloud services providers. Although SDS is at a very early stage, its potential market opportunity has attracted globally established providers such as EMC and HP, while Chinese vendors such as DataCore and global startups such as Nexenta have also introduced relevant solutions.

Web-scale IT

To most of Chinese enterprises, Web-scale IT is a new concept that will be driven by the trend of consumerization. The rise of consumer culture is changing the way enterprises do business. Digital marketing and e-commerce require an efficient and agile IT support and, given the large mobile and Internet population of China, scalability will be a big issue. All these factors challenge the conventional IT approach in terms of scalability, cost, and speed to respond. Web-scale IT focuses not only on potentially being able to scale IT-related facilities and technology, but also the associated operational processes and supporting organizational structure in the context of a more risk-embracing culture.

3D Printing

3D printing is achieved by using an additive process through a device able to create physical objects from digital models. The market is broadly divided into three segments: bioprinting, consumer 3D printing and enterprise 3D printing. The main advantage of 3D printing is to build custom or low-volume items that aren’t being mass manufactured. There are many very real opportunities for 3D printing in China, from product design and manufacture of 3D printers and printing materials, bioprinting to 3D printing services provided as an export.

Reference: Emerging Market Analysis: China’s Top 10 Technology Trends in 2014 (You need sign in to view this report).