Xiaomi statistics show that the company is getting better by the day, while its competition is losing ground. It’s inevitable—the Chinese brand has a huge ecosystem. It might not be as aggressive as Apple’s, but Xiaomi is past the point of manufacturing smartphones. It’s producing pretty much everything nowadays.
Even if you’re not a fan of the brand, the amazing Xiaomi facts below might just change your mind. Honestly, I wasn’t a fan until two years ago, either.
But then, the company went in a different direction that I couldn’t ignore. Now, Xiaomi is selling quality lifestyle products with a minimalistic design at incredible prices. Well, how can I not be a fan of that?!
Some Fascinating Xiaomi Stats to Get You Hooked
- Xiaomi's annual revenue for 2020 was about 38.4 billion dollars.
- Its adjusted net profit grew by over 87% YOY as of Q2 2021.
- Xiaomi’s market share reached 16% during Q2 of 2021.
- Xiaomi sold 15,000 smartphones in two seconds in India.
- It holds 16% of the global smartphone market share as of Q2 2021.
- Xiaomi surpassed Apple in wearables in Q2 2021.
- The company shipped 44.3 million smartphones in Q3 2021.
Xiaomi Company Details
1. Lei Jun owns Xiaomi.
(Source: Mi)
Chinese entrepreneur Lei Jun founded Xiaomi in 2010. He is the founder, chairman, CEO, and executive director of Xiaomi. He has a Bachelor's degree in Computer Science from Wuhan University and is considered one of the top economic personalities of China.
His first big achievement was Joyo.com, which he went on to sell to Amazon for an astonishing $75 million. His next big venture—Xiaomi—turned out to be a great success too. The entrepreneur's net worth as of 2021 is close to $17 billion.
2. Xiaomi is based in Beijing, China.
(Source: Reuters)
Perhaps it isn’t a huge surprise that the Chinese company Xiaomi is based in China. I mean, the whole tech world is based in China. That said, Xiaomi has been manufacturing its products mainly in India during the past five years.
As they state on the official website: "99% of our smartphones and 100% of our smart TVs are manufactured in India". When it comes to Xiaomi statistics, the people who run the company probably know best, so we won’t challenge them on that one.
3. Xiaomi means “little rice.”
(Source: Mi)
The meaning of Xiaomi is literally “little rice.” It comes from the words “xiao” (little) and “mi” (rice). That’s just the tip of the iceberg, though.
The whole world also means “millet,” which is a cereal. If you go through the ROM files of Xiaomi products (e.g., its routers), you might see some of them being called "millet."
The company also claims that the “MI” in its logo stands for “mobile internet” or “mission impossible.” Who knew that there are so many fun facts about Xiaomi’s name? The founders certainly put some thought into it.
4. Xiaomi’s mascot is a bunny called Mitu.
(Source: One Android)
Mitu is a rabbit wearing a puffy Russian-style hat known as "ushanka." For quite some time, it had a red star on it, which is a notorious communist symbol.
Since then, however, Xiaomi has released a fun range of collectible figures. In this collection, Mitu is a space explorer, photographer, keyboard maniac, and technician. No red stars in sight.
The Xiaomi Smartphone World
5. People love Xiaomi devices because they are reliable.
(Source: Mia Africa)
There are many reasons why Xiaomi became such a huge player in the smartphone world. Without the competition from Huawei, Xiaomi found a niche—offering functional devices at surprisingly low prices.
Many people don’t care for the ultra-expensive features of Samsung’s Ultra devices or Apple’s iPhone Pro. The average user needs a phone that works without hiccups, takes good photos, and is overall reliable.
And that’s where Xiaomi shines. Mid-rangers like the Xiaomi 11T or Mi 11 Lite 5G offer incredible quality at an unbeatable price that makes Samsung sweat. And that’s coming from a Samsung user.
6. Xiaomi sold 40 million Redmi Note devices in seven months.
(Source: NDTV)
If you see a smartphone like the Xiaomi Redmi Note 10 Pro, you probably won’t believe its price. 33W charging, 108 MP wide-angle camera, 120 Hz AMOLED FHD+ display with 1,200 nits peak brightness. That’s WAY too many great specs for a phone that costs about $300.
This is one of Xiaomi’s global phones that took the fans of budget devices by storm. And it shows. So far, the Xiaomi Redmi sales have been great. The company announced it had sold over 240 million Redmi Note devices by October 2021.
Even more impressive is that 40 million of these Redmi Note devices were sold in just about seven months. I guess the Xiaomi global store has been pretty busy lately.
7. Xiaomi 11T Pro comes with a hyper-fast 120W charger that takes about 20 minutes to power your phone.
(Source: Mi)
This is probably when even pretentious tech lovers like me started thinking if they should switch from Samsung to Xiaomi. Honestly, I’m getting tired of the awful battery life and lackluster abilities of the Exynos chips that Samsung ships to Europe.
And when the Xiaomi 11T Pro came out… come on. It’s around the price of a FE edition, but it’s just so much better! It has a Snapdragon 888 and 120W HyperCharge ability that takes the phone from zero to 100 in less than 20 minutes.
Smartphone addicts, get excited! Is it time to say goodbye to my S20 FE?
Xiaomi Market Share
8. Xiaomi’s market share reached 16% during Q2 of 2021.
(Source: NDTV)
Xiaomi's market share in Q1 of 2021 was 14% and went up to 16% in Q2. The Xiaomi sales in 2021 reached 52.5 million units in that period, which was enough to make it the second-best global smartphone vendor.
9. Xiaomi's revenue took a little hit in Q3 of 2021, as the company sold “just” 44.3 million phones.
(Source: Counterpoint Research)
Xiaomi’s revenue grew 64% since Q2 of 2020, but these numbers declined a bit in Q3 where the company sold "just" 44.3 million devices. The company slid down to 14% once again, as in Q1.
In Central and Eastern Europe, though, Xiaomi destroys its competition with a 42-percent market share. In other words, even though Xiaomi's revenue in 2021 declined a bit in Q3, the year is still very successful for the company.
10. You can’t buy a Xiaomi phone in the US (at least not officially).
(Source: Goody Feed)
Even though the Trump-era ban on Xiaomi was removed by the Biden administration, you can only buy Xiaomi IoT devices and other smart gadgets, but not a phone.
The Xiaomi sales in the United States are practically zero for now. The situation in India, however, reveals a totally different picture.
The Xiaomi India sales reached incredible heights—the company sold 15,000 Mi3 phones in two seconds! Again in India, in 2014, the company set a Guinness world record, reaching 2.1 million sales in a day.
11. Xiaomi has a 9.9% ROCE.
(Source: Simply Wall St)
ROCE stands for "returns on capital employed.” It indicates the company’s earnings before taxes in relation to the capital employed (total assets minus current liabilities). Without getting into the nitty-gritty of financial terminology, it's good for the company when these numbers are increasing.
Xiaomi stats from Q2 of 2021 show it has a ROCE of 9.9%. While this isn’t particularly impressive, it’s still higher than the tech industry’s average of 8%. All in all, Xiaomi’s earnings are good and stable.
Xiaomi Demographics
To understand the company’s success better, let’s take a look at its user base.
12. Xiaomi is the third most popular phone in the world.
(Source: Strategy Analytics)
The main Xiaomi competitors, Samsung and Apple, are ahead of the Chinese brand… for now. Samsung is still the undisputed worldwide champion with 69 million phones sold as of Q3 of 2021. It’s followed by Apple with 50.4 million and Xiaomi with 44.3 million.
Xiaomi also bragged it has over 450 million monthly active MIUI users. That’s how many people are using Xiaomi phones on a regular basis. Let’s see who they are.
13. It’s getting harder to count the Xiaomi users by country—the company is among the five leading brands in 47 of them.
(Source: Equal Ocean)
At the beginning of 2021, Xiaomi was a leading brand in 12 countries. By August, it was among the top five smartphone vendors in 47 markets around the world.
Surprisingly, Xiaomi’s China sales aren’t as high as you might think. The company is behind Vivo, Oppo, and the comeback kid Honor. Things are changing rapidly, though, so we might see completely different Xiaomi statistics by the end of 2021.
Xiaomi is a leading brand in Spain, India, Russia, Poland, Ukraine, Belarus, Myanmar, and Greece. Contrary to expectations, it’s going strong in Central and Eastern European markets.
14. 69% of Xiaomi users are men.
(Source: GizmoChina)
A 2018 study showed that Xiaomi phones are more popular among the male population. Unfortunately, there isn't more recent data on this.
Still, Xiaomi grew a lot in the past three years, so it's reasonable to assume this number has changed at least slightly. Maybe that's why Xiaomi 11 Lite 5G is pink.
15. If you divide Xiaomi users by age, the largest segment is between 30 and 34.
(Source: GizmoChina)
The same 2018 report shows that 31.7% of Xiaomi users are in the 30-34 age bracket. Next come people between 25 and 29 with 25.4%. No surprise there.
Younger individuals (mostly teenagers) tend to base their choice on what's "trendy." People over 25 are more likely to prioritize efficiency and functionality and don't care about the outside noise as much.
Xiaomi News
Last but not least, let’s take a look at some noteworthy events from Xiaomi’s history.
16. Xiaomi 12 will be one of the first phones with Snapdragon 898.
(Source: GSM Arena)
Qualcomm is going to announce its new flagship chipset in November 2021, and Xiaomi 12 is among the first phones to get the brand new chip. It’ll be about 15% more powerful than its predecessor—the Snapdragon 888.
Xiaomi 12 is supposed to be the first phone with the new chip. Among the Xiaomi competitors for the new flagship processor are Motorola, Samsung, Oppo, Vivo, Huawei, and Lenovo.
17. Xiaomi vs Samsung: Xiaomi’s market share in Europe grew from 4% in 2019 to 24% in Q2 of 2021.
(Source: Sammobile)
As we mentioned above, Xiaomi overtook Samsung earlier this year. The company quickly filled the void left by Huawei, so Samsung still can't take a breather.
But is Xiaomi better than Samsung? Well, it certainly beats it in terms of price, battery life, charging power, and even sales support. It also arguably has a better ecosystem. Xiaomi wearables cost way less, and it offers an incredible range of IoT products.
Besides, Xiaomi statistics show that the Chinese brand is a serious challenge for Samsung in Europe. Its market share grew from 4% in 2019 to 24% in the 2nd quarter of 2021.
Samsung saw that threat and started offering budget-friendly, mid-range solutions too. Galaxy A51, for example, is slightly better and hiccup-free than the otherwise beautiful Mi 11 Lite 5G and 11 Lite 5G NE—especially when it comes to mobile gaming.
18. Xiaomi vs Apple: Xiaomi aims to surpass Apple and all its competitors in the next three years.
(Source: GSM Arena)
This is probably the battle of the year when it comes to global market share. In Q2 2021, Xiaomi took second place. However, Apple took it back at the end of Q3, with a 14% growth. In the meantime, Xiaomi saw a 7% decline.
However, Lu Weibing, senior VP of Xiaomi Group China, said that Xiaomi plans to surpass Apple and all other competitors to become the world leader in smartphone sales.
Xiaomi is planning to open about 20,000 more retail stores in China in the next three years. This shows that the brand is working hard on upgrading its retail game.
19. Xiaomi vs Huawei: Huawei dropped from 20% global market share in Q2 of 2020 to not even being in the picture anymore.
(Source: Counterpoint Research)
While Huawei is pretty much dead for the global market after the 2020 US sanctions, the battle for China’s market is something completely different. Huawei received a devastating hit on an international level, but it’s still a very strong player locally.
Still, Vivo dominates the Chinese market with a 23% share. Next comes Oppo (20%) and then the now independent Honor (15%).
Xiaomi‘s ranking in China is a tad above Apple’s (14% vs 13% market share). Huawei has shrunk down a lot since 2020, going from 30% to just 8% market share in Q3 2021 in China.
We could say that Huawei is kind of a dying breed on the smartphone market and Honor is basically the new Huawei.
20. Xiaomi bought Deepmotion for $77.3 million.
(Source: Tech Crunch)
Xiaomi acquired the tech startup Deepmotion for $77.3 million in August 2021. Deepmotion develops mapping technology for autonomous vehicles.
Does that mean that Xiaomi has put a target on Tesla? We could only hope they'll create cool, minimalist self-driving cars at reasonable prices, right?
Wrap Up
Did you enjoy all these Xiaomi statistics and numbers? Or do you need more Xiaomi facts? It was fun collecting them all for you!
All in all, Xiaomi is a reliable brand that has plenty to offer. And it seems like it has much more in store!
Sources
Unaware that life beyond the internet exists, Nick is poking servers and control panels, playing with WordPress add-ons, and helping people get the hosting that suits them.
