Apple's Retail Push into China Still Limited, But Ramping Up

Back in February 2010, Apple's then-retail chief Ron Johnson noted during the company's annual shareholder meeting that it was planning to open up to 25 retail stores in China over the following two years. At the time, Apple operated only a single store in Beijing that had opened in time for the 2008 Summer Olympics held there.

apple store hk ifc mall night
Apple's IFC Mall retail store in Hong Kong

Well more than two years later, Apple still has only six retail stores in its Greater China region, with five in China proper and one in Hong Kong. And as noted by Reuters, Apple has more stores in Pennsylvania (eight) than it does in Greater China.

The shortage of retail stores and authorized re-sellers leaves ample room for unlicensed re-sellers to move in. Bad consumer experiences at these unauthorized shops are common and they run the risk of eventually eroding confidence in Apple's products, said David Wolf, chief executive of Beijing-based consultancy Wolf Group Asia.

If Apple doesn't expand its network of stores and authorized re-sellers, it "loses not only near-term sales, it also endangers the sustainability of its success in China," he said.

The report does not pin down the reasons behind Apple's slower-than-planned pace of retail store expansion in China, only suggesting that the company may be running up against bureaucratic hurdles that have complicated its plans.

Apple may, however, be nearly ready for a substantial expansion of its retail footprint in China, as M.I.C. gadget just yesterday posted a summary of six more stores that are currently in the works. Most of the locations have been discussed at one time or another in recent months, but the new summary provides a consolidated picture of what Apple's Chinese customers can expect. The forthcoming locations include:

- Shenzhen: One of Foxconn's major hubs for iOS device production, Shenzhen will see a new Apple retail store going in at the Yitian Plaza shopping mall, according to M.I.C. gadget. The report includes photos of a boarded-up section of the mall where Apple is rumored to be building a two-level store, with an opening predicted for late this year or early next year.

- Chengdu: Apple appears set to open two retail stores in Chengdu, another of Foxconn's manufacturing hubs in China. The first may open as soon as September in the high-end Raffles Square district while the second is said to be a major store opening at the MixC shopping center. That location may open in December.

- Guangzhou: Relatively few details on this location are known, but according to the report Apple is preparing to open a store in the Grand City Plaza district. Major renovations for the area have, however, yet to take place.

- Dalian: As we previously covered, Apple is said to be planning its world's largest retail store for Dalian in northeastern China. No details on an opening are yet known, but previous information suggested that work was indeed underway on the store.

- Hong Kong: In February 2011, reports claimed that Apple would be opening two retail stores in Hong Kong: a 15,000 square foot location at the IFC Mall by the end of 2011 and a 20,000 square foot location at Hysan Place by the second or third quarter of 2012. The IFC Mall store did open in September 2011, and M.I.C. gadget indicates that Apple should at least come close to meeting its target for the Hysan Place store with a late 2012 or early 2013 opening.

Popular Stories

iPhone 17 Pro Blue Feature Tighter Crop

iPhone 17 Pro Launching in Three Months With These 12 New Features

Saturday June 14, 2025 5:45 pm PDT by
The iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max are three months away, and there are plenty of rumors about the devices. Below, we recap key changes rumored for the iPhone 17 Pro models as of June 2025:Aluminum frame: iPhone 17 Pro models are rumored to have an aluminum frame, whereas the iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro models have a titanium frame, and the iPhone X through iPhone 14 Pro have a...
iPadOS 26 App Windowing

Apple Explains Why iPads Don't Just Run macOS

Friday June 13, 2025 7:46 am PDT by
iPadOS 26 allows iPads to function much more like Macs, with a new app windowing system, a swipe-down menu bar at the top of the screen, and more. However, Apple has stopped short of allowing iPads to run macOS, and it has now explained why. In an interview this week with Swiss tech journalist Rafael Zeier, Apple's software engineering chief Craig Federighi said that iPadOS 26's new Mac-like ...
Logitech Logo Feature

Logitech Announces Two New Accessories for WWDC

Friday June 13, 2025 7:22 am PDT by
Alongside WWDC this week, Logitech announced notable new accessories for the iPad and Apple Vision Pro. The Logitech Muse is a spatially-tracked stylus developed for use with the Apple Vision Pro. Introduced during the WWDC 2025 keynote address, Muse is intended to support the next generation of spatial computing workflows enabled by visionOS 26. The device incorporates six degrees of...
iphone 16 pro models 1

17 Reasons to Wait for the iPhone 17

Thursday June 12, 2025 8:58 am PDT by
Apple's iPhone development roadmap runs several years into the future and the company is continually working with suppliers on several successive iPhone models simultaneously, which is why we often get rumored features months ahead of launch. The iPhone 17 series is no different, and we already have a good idea of what to expect from Apple's 2025 smartphone lineup. If you skipped the iPhone...
iOS 26 Feature

Apple Seeds Revised iOS 26 Developer Beta to Fix Battery Issue

Friday June 13, 2025 10:15 am PDT by
Apple today provided developers with a revised version of the first iOS 26 beta for testing purposes. The update is only available for the iPhone 15 and iPhone 16 models, so if you're running iOS 26 on an iPhone 14 or earlier, you won't see the revised beta. Registered developers can download the new beta software through the Settings app on each device. The revised beta addresses an...
Mac Studio Feature

Apple Begins Selling Refurbished Mac Studio With M4 Max and M3 Ultra Chips at a Discount

Thursday June 12, 2025 10:14 am PDT by
Apple today added Mac Studio models with M4 Max and M3 Ultra chips to its online certified refurbished store in the United States, Canada, Japan, Singapore, and many European countries, for the first time since they were released in March. As usual for refurbished Macs, prices are discounted by approximately 15% compared to the equivalent new models on Apple's online store. Note that Apple's ...
m4 macbook air pink

Apple Now Selling Refurbished M4 MacBook Air Models

Friday June 13, 2025 3:34 pm PDT by
Apple today added M4 MacBook Air models to its refurbished store in the United States, making the latest MacBook Air devices available at a discounted price for the first time since they launched earlier this year. Both 13-inch and 15-inch MacBook Air models are available, with Apple offering multiple capacities and configurations. The refurbished devices are discounted by approximately 15...

Top Rated Comments

charlieegan3 Avatar
169 months ago
Thats one cool looking Apple Store.
Score: 12 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Galatian Avatar
169 months ago
Great...when is Berlin - the 3.5 Mio inhabitants counting capital of Germany - finally getting an Apple Store? Why do I have to deal with those idiots at Gravis? Seriously one of their repair guys wanted to tell me that just because my keyboard was broken the entire logic board had to be switched out. His reasoning was, after I wanted that to be explained, that when you hit a key it PHYSICALLY connects to the main board...Needless to say I just ordered a new keyboard (which included an entire upper case on the MacBook Pro by the way and costs you some 250€) and installed it myself. We need competent people fast!
Score: 11 Votes (Like | Disagree)
apolloa Avatar
169 months ago
Don't care what anyone says, the store in the picture on this article is the coolest Apple have ever made IMO.
Score: 7 Votes (Like | Disagree)
reverie Avatar
169 months ago
Most likely the problem is local corruption.
Score: 7 Votes (Like | Disagree)
thelookingglass Avatar
169 months ago
What's wrong with Pennsylvania? It's huge.

Nothing's wrong with Pennsylvania, just that the both the land mass and the population of Pennsylvania are a teeny tiny fraction of China's. China has 5 times more people than the US, yet one state in the US has more Apple stores than China.

These new stores are all sensible locations, except for Dalian. Shenzhen and Guangzhou are two of the richest cities in the country. Chengdu is clearly the financial hub of western China and is home to an increasing number of multinational corporations. Don't understand Dalian though. I would've thought Chongqing or Tianjin made more sense.
Score: 7 Votes (Like | Disagree)
digitalhen Avatar
169 months ago
Not sure how you figure that. It's basically in Central. In a premium mall, 5 minutes walk from the Star Ferry, HK station, Central station (4 train lines). Central is absolutely packed with shops (and shoppers).

The offices on top (and one stop away at Kowloon) are where all the banks and finance are in HK. The mall and the store itself is rammed all weekend.
Score: 5 Votes (Like | Disagree)