As is widely known, Huawei's smartphone sales surpassed 200 million units in 2018, ranking third globally and closing in on Apple.

Then, in 2019, Huawei overtook Apple to become the world's second-largest smartphone vendor, trailing only Samsung, with 240 million phones sold that year.

Starting in 2020, however, Huawei faced increasingly tightened U.S. restrictions targeting its chip supply. The company sold off Honor, and its sales naturally declined steadily. By 2021, annual sales had fallen to only about 30 million units—a drop of more than 80% from the peak.

Many people say that when Huawei fell, Xiaomi and Apple feasted on the spoils, and that all of Huawei's lost market share was captured by Xiaomi and Apple.

So the question arises: was Huawei's lost share really taken by Apple and Xiaomi? Let us examine global sales from 2018 to 2025 so everyone can see what actually happened.

As shown in the figure below, this is a chart tracking data changes for the three major manufacturers from 2018 to 2025.

It is clear that in 2021, Huawei's sales plummeted, moving 200 million fewer units in a single year than at the 2019 peak.

In 2021, Xiaomi and Apple's sales did indeed rise somewhat. Apple jumped directly from nearly 200 million units to 240 million units, selling more than 40 million additional units in a year. Xiaomi rose from 145 million units to 190 million units, also selling more than 40 million additional units.

To a certain extent, Apple and Xiaomi did indeed capture nearly 100 million phone sales from Huawei. About half of Huawei's lost users were taken by Apple and Xiaomi.

But after 2022, the users Apple gained were largely retained, as subsequent sales remained above 230 million units and did not fall again.

Xiaomi, however, fell back to about 140 million units in 2022—almost back to where it started—and nearly lost them all again, enjoying only a one-year dividend period.

Let us also look at domestic market data for Huawei, Apple, and Xiaomi.

Huawei's peak was also in 2019, with domestic sales as high as 140 million units, after which they fell to 30 million units in 2021—a loss of 100 million units in domestic sales.

But Apple and Xiaomi did not capture much of that. For example, Xiaomi changed only slightly in 2021, selling 10 million more units, and then returned to the starting point. Apple improved slightly, but not by much.

Especially after 2023, Huawei's sales rose, but Apple and Xiaomi's sales remained quite stable and did not decline because of Huawei's recovery.

It can be seen that in the global market, Apple indeed captured Huawei's lost share and held it firmly, while Xiaomi hardly captured any.

In the domestic market, Huawei's lost share was not taken much by Apple and Xiaomi. More of it was actually captured by Honor, OPPO, and VIVO. What do you think?