India beats China as top smartphone exporter to the US

India has emerged as the largest manufacturing hub for smartphones shipped into the US for the first time in Q2, 2025, as China's share shrunk amid tariff negotiations, according to Canalys.

The research from Canalys (now part of Omdia) revealed that United States smartphone shipments grew 1 per cent in the second quarter of the current calendar year as vendors continued to frontload device inventories amid tariff concerns.

The uncertain outcome of negotiations with China has accelerated supply chain reorientation, it said.

The share of US smartphone shipments assembled in China fell to 25 per cent in the April-June period, from 61 per cent a year earlier.

"Most of this decline has been picked up by India; the total volume of 'Made-in-India' smartphones grew 240 per cent year-on-year and now accounts for 44 per cent of smartphones imported into the US, up from only 13 per cent of smartphone shipments in Q2 2024," it said.

In Q2, iPhone shipments declined 11 per cent year-on-year to 13.3 million units, a correction from the 25 per cent growth in Q1, 2025, as per Canalys.

Samsung's shipments grew 38 per cent year-on-year to 8.3 million units.

Motorola continued its expansion in the US, growing two per cent to 3.2 million units. Google and TCL rounded off the top five, with Google growing 13 per cent to 0.8 million while TCL declined 23 per cent, shipping 0.7 million units.

"India became the leading manufacturing hub for smartphones sold in the US for the very first time in Q2 2025, largely driven by Apple's accelerated supply chain shift to India amid an uncertain trade landscape between the US and China," said Sanyam Chaurasia, Principal Analyst at Canalys.

Apple has scaled up its production capacity in India over the last several years as a part of its 'China Plus One' strategy and has opted to dedicate most of its export capacity in India to supply the US market so far in 2025, Chaurasia said.

"Apple has begun manufacturing and assembling Pro models of the iPhone 16 series in India, but is still dependent on established manufacturing bases in China for the scaled supply needed for Pro models in the US. Samsung and Motorola have also increased their share of US-targeted supply from India, although their shifts are significantly slower and smaller in scale than Apple's," Chaurasia said.

Motorola, similar to Apple, has its core manufacturing hub in China, whereas Samsung relies mainly upon producing its smartphones in Vietnam, Chaurasia noted.

Inputs from PTI