India pips China to become largest exporter of smartphones to US

• Apple scales up its production capacity in India over the last several years as a part of its ‘China Plus One’ strategy
• 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.

The share of US smartphone shipments assembled in China shrank from 61 per cent in Q2 2024 to 25 per cent in Q2 2025 and most of this decline has been picked up by India, according to a new report.

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, according to resecrh firm Canalys (now part of Omdia).

“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 leads the charge

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.

 “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,” Chaurasia said.

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

The United States smartphone shipments grew by 1 per cent in Q2 2025 as vendors continued to frontload device inventories amid tariff concerns.

The uncertain outcome of negotiations with China has accelerated supply chain reorientation. Apple built up its inventories rapidly toward the end of Q1 and sought to maintain this level in Q2.

Samsung scaled up its inventory stock in Q2, boosting its shipments to grow 38 per cent year on year, predominantly driven by Galaxy A-series devices, said the report.