Apple sold 3.6 million iPhones in China in May, down 7.7 percent from 3.9 million iPhones sold in April but was up from 3.05 million a year earlier, according to market research firm CINNO.
In April, iPhone sales in China rose 160 percent from the previous month, thanks to the release of pent-up demand and a rebooted economy. In February, iPhone sales in China were down 60% from the same month last year due to the novel coronavirus pneumonia outbreak.
However, according to preliminary estimates released by another research firm IDC, iPhone shipments to China in May were just over 2 million units, down about 25 percent from the previous month.
Shipments are the number of iPhones Apple sells to Chinese retail partners, which can be used to assess future demand.