Competition bites as Apple offers discounts on iPhones

Consumers can save up to 500 yuan (US$69) when buying iPhones during the 2025 new year sales on Apple China's website, starting from Saturday.

The move by the United States giant comes on the heels of Chinese rival Huawei's recent announcement of significant price cuts on its high-end smartphone lines.

The discounts will be offered from Saturday to Tuesday at Apple China's official online stores, with iPhone 16 models eligible for 400 to 500 yuan discount and Mac computers enjoying discounts of up to 800 yuan. The trade-in policies also work after the discount, Apple announced.

On Thursday afternoon, the "Apple's official discount" was a top trending topic on social media platform Weibo, the Chinese equivalent of X, formerly Twitter. Previously, Apple had announced price cuts mainly on third-party channels like Tmall and JD.com.

Netizens, however, were not overly enthused by the discount, many deeming it not attractive at all.

All major e-commerce platforms anyway offer discounts for iPhone 16 models, often above 1,000 yuan. Therefore, Apple's offer was not competitive in the market, according to Weibo user "fenibook."

Comparatively, Huawei offered discounts of up to 2,500 yuan for its high-end Pura and X product lines.

Facing stiff competition pressure, especially in the domestic market, Apple has been indulging in price cuts since October, industry officials said.

Customers, who have just bought Apple products, can return them for re-purchase if the models were bought within 14 days prior to the event. This can be interpreted as a refund of the difference in price, Apple explained.