Huawei in 2024: The Resurgence of Kirin, the Soaring of HarmonyOS, and Maintaining Industry Leadership

Huawei in 2024: The Resurgence of Kirin, the Soaring of HarmonyOS, and Maintaining Industry Leadership2024 was a landmark year for Huawei. After navigating significant challenges, Huawei made a strong comeback, demonstrating remarkable resilience and innovation in the smartphone market

Huawei in 2024: The Resurgence of Kirin, the Soaring of HarmonyOS, and Maintaining Industry Leadership

2024 was a landmark year for Huawei. After navigating significant challenges, Huawei made a strong comeback, demonstrating remarkable resilience and innovation in the smartphone market. The return of the Kirin chip, the official launch of the native HarmonyOS, and the stunning debut of the Mate XT tri-folding screen phone all marked crucial milestones in Huawei's annual development history. This article will delve into Huawei's remarkable achievements in 2024, highlighting its significant advancements in technological innovation and market share.

The Power of "Xin": The Full Return of Kirin Chips Drives Huawei's Smartphone Market Share Growth

In April 2024, the launch of the Huawei Pura70 series ushered in the return of Huawei's Kirin chips. The Pura70 Ultra, equipped with a processor identified by third-party software as the "Kirin 9010," marked a significant breakthrough for Huawei in the chip sector. Subsequently, the nova13 series and Pocket2 also incorporated Kirin chips, expanding their application range.

In November, the highly anticipated Huawei Mate70 series was officially released. This series featured HarmonyOS AI and a new satellite paging function. Huawei officially claimed a 40% overall performance improvement, making it arguably the most powerful Mate series phone ever. While Huawei didn't publicly disclose the specific chip model, software detection revealed it to be the Kirin 9020 processor.

However, Huawei's most eye-catching product of 2024 was undoubtedly the Mate XT tri-folding screen phone, launched in September. This phone showcased bold innovations in materials, technology, and craftsmanship, becoming the world's first commercially available tri-folding screen phone. Its unique advertising slogan, "Tri-fold, always a perfect angle," quickly became a viral sensation, sparking widespread attention and discussion.

In early January 2025, Huawei launched the Huawei Enjoy 70X, powered by the Kirin 8000A chip, bringing the starting price of Kirin-powered phones down to 1799 and further expanding market reach. By this point, most models in Huawei's Enjoy, nova, Pocket, Mate, and Pura series incorporated Kirin platforms, signifying the complete return of Huawei's smartphones to self-developed chips.

Thanks to the return of Kirin chips and a strong product offensive, Huawei's market performance in 2024 was remarkable. Data from Counterpoint Research shows that Huawei ranked fourth in domestic smartphone sales in Q1 2024, with market share increasing to 15.5%, a year-on-year growth of 69.7%. In Q2, Huawei rose to third place, holding a 15.4% market share, with a year-on-year growth of 44.5%. In Q3, Huawei maintained its third position with a 15.3% market share, growing by 42% year-on-year (Source: IDC). In Q4, Huawei and vivo both held 17% market share, ranking second and third respectively, with Huawei maintaining a year-on-year growth rate exceeding 20% (Source: Canalys). Overall, Huawei secured second place in the domestic smartphone market in 2024, shipping 46 million units, representing a remarkable 37% year-on-year growth. This clearly demonstrates Huawei's strong comeback and its continued leading position in the industry after weathering a challenging period.

The "Pure-Blood" HarmonyOS Era: HarmonyOS NEXT Ushers in a New Chapter of Universal Connectivity

In October 2024, Huawei held a "Native HarmonyOS Night," officially launching HarmonyOS NEXT, also known as HarmonyOS Native. Huawei positioned it as a full-scenario smart operating system for the era of universal connectivity. HarmonyOS NEXT achieved comprehensive breakthroughs in core operating system technologies. Its new system architecture brought significant performance improvements, marking the largest upgrade since the operating system's inception.

Huawei's rotating chairman, Meng Wanzhou, mentioned in her 2025 New Year's address: "In the race towards universal connectivity, 2024 was a crucial year for native HarmonyOS, with the HarmonyOS ecosystem setting sail. The HarmonyOS Thousand Sails Plan received enthusiastic responses from numerous industry partners. In just one year, we have traversed the development path that other operating systems took over a decade to achieve, creating the 'HarmonyOS Speed.'"

Official data from October 2024 showed HarmonyOS holding a top 2 market share position domestically, boasting over 110 million+ lines of code and 6.75 million registered developers. After five years of development, HarmonyOS has become a highly vibrant digital foundation. Data at the time indicated over 1 billion HarmonyOS ecosystem devices and over 15,000 native HarmonyOS apps and services available.

News from early 2025 revealed that new Huawei phones, tablets, and wearables would come pre-installed with the native HarmonyOS, and more older devices would gradually receive native HarmonyOS upgrades. Prior to this, the Mate70 series, released at the end of November 2024, came with HarmonyOS 4.3 and offered an upgrade path to native HarmonyOS. This signifies that future Huawei products will directly run native HarmonyOS, ushering in the "pure-blood HarmonyOS" era.

Diversified Layout: Continued Growth in the Automotive Business and Steady Progress in Areas Such as Smart Homes

Beyond the strong recovery of its mobile phone business, Huawei also made significant strides in other areas. In the automotive sector, the cumulative deliveries of the AITO M7 in 2024 surpassed 190,000 units, maintaining its leading position among new energy vehicle brands for 12 consecutive months. The AITO M9, with models priced above 500,000, became the sales champion in its segment, accumulating over 190,000 pre-orders in 11 months since launch.

Huawei's overall performance in 2024 was more mature and stable, with steady progress across various businesses. The widespread adoption of Kirin chips and native HarmonyOS enhanced the self-developed capabilities of its products. Simultaneously, Huawei continued to invest in sustainable business sectors such as automotive technology support, system services, and smart homes, laying a solid foundation for future growth.

Conclusion: Looking Ahead, Continued Innovation

In 2024, Huawei demonstrated its strong technological capabilities and market competitiveness through the return of Kirin chips, the launch of the native HarmonyOS, and the steady development of its diverse businesses. In the future, Huawei will continue to pursue innovation, providing consumers with even better products and services and continuing to lead industry development. Huawei is poised to achieve even more remarkable accomplishments in the years to come.