The Advancement of WiFi 6 Wireless Router Market Report for the First Half of 2020

In the first half of 2020, affected by the epidemic, remote work, video conferencing, and online classes at home have become mainstream network applications. As more people are at home and everyone is online, freezes frequently occur, and home wireless routers usher in a wave of upgrades. In addition, major manufacturers have launched popular WiFi 6 wireless routers, and the price has dropped from last year's thousand yuan level to around 200 yuan. The price reduction has laid the foundation for the popularization of WiFi 6 routers to ordinary families. In addition, various new supporting terminal products are basically equipped with wireless network cards that support WiFi 6, and the popularization period of WiFi 6 routers officially began in the first half of 2020.

Basic data analysis

1. The era of home WiFi 6 is really here

Proportion of attention paid to WiFi technology in the domestic wireless router market in the first half of 2020

Why is it said that the first half of 2020 has opened the door for WiFi 6 routers to be popularized in ordinary households? Looking at the data, we can see that when netizens choose wireless routers, the proportion of WiFi 6 technology routers preferred is as high as 51.09%, and more than half of netizens want to upgrade to WiFi 6 routers. WiFi technology is backward compatible, and there is no situation where existing terminals do not support new WiFi 6 routers, so WiFi 5 and WiFi 4 products are gradually being phased out, and the era of WiFi 6 is here!

2. Strong leadership and competition among competitors

Top 10 wireless routers in China in 2020

Data from the first half of 2020 show that Huawei has maintained strong growth and has opened up a gap with other manufacturers. In 2019, although Huawei ranked first in the router market, its attention ratio was 16.8%. The second-ranked TP-LINK had an attention ratio of 14.9%. It can be said that Huawei just surpassed TP-LINK last year. But in the first half of 2020, the attention ratio of Huawei routers jumped to 31.6%, 7 percentage points higher than the second-ranked TP-LINK, widening the gap.

Huawei has been able to achieve such rapid growth thanks to its strong launch of the WiFi 6+ smart router AX3 and AX3 Pro in the first half of 2020. These two products allow users to purchase a 3000Mbps WiFi 6 router for only 229 yuan or 329 yuan, while competing products of the same performance level on the market are priced at more than 399 yuan. In addition, Huawei Router also launched the upgraded product Q2S for power line networking to further enhance users' Internet experience.

TP-LINK, which ranks second, has also launched new products in the WiFi 6 router market. Its WiFi 6 routers basically cover the low-end to high-end categories. However, its WiFi 6 products are not as cost-effective as Huawei's, and its high-end products are squeezed by ASUS and Netgear. It can be said that it is under attack from both sides. However, TP-LINK is still very influential in the WiFi 5 router market, which is why it ranks second.

Xiaomi and Tenda ranked third and fourth, with market brand attention of 11.7% and 8.2% respectively. Xiaomi can be said to have fired the first shot in the WiFi 6 router market in 2020. The AX3600, with its price of 599 yuan, was the first to bring the powerful WiFi 6 router to enthusiasts and network enthusiasts. Although the price of AX1800 is also 229 yuan, its performance is only 1800Mbps, which is significantly lower than Huawei's router AX3. Tenda did not have any new WiFi 6 products in the first half of the year, but it still maintained a good ranking by relying on WiFi 5 routers. The two 2100Mbps routers, AC23 and AC21, which cost only 100 yuan, were also popular with consumers.

The fifth to tenth places are ASUS, Honor, Netgear, Ji Router, Mercury, and 360 respectively.

Throughout the first half of 2020, the domestic wireless router market was dominated by Huawei, with other manufacturers emerging as competitors.

3. Price attention is evenly distributed

Price focus range of China's wireless router market in 2020

In the first half of 2020, consumers' attention to low-priced routers and other price range routers is gradually equalizing. Especially affected by the epidemic, people are working and entertaining at home. Only by choosing a good router can they have a good Internet experience.

From the data, although the proportion of attention to wireless router products below 100 yuan still ranks first with 18.43%, the overall gap with other attention intervals is not large. The proportion of attention to 100-150 yuan is 16.11%, the proportion of attention to 150-200 yuan is 16.46%, the proportion of attention to 200-300 yuan is 15.03%, the proportion of attention to 300-500 yuan is 12.62%, the proportion of attention to 500-1000 yuan is 10.4%, and the proportion of attention to products above 1000 yuan is 10.89%. It can be seen that wireless routers priced between 100 and 500 yuan are still the first choice of consumers, and the proportion of attention to mid-to-high-end routers above 500-1000 yuan is rising, and consumers are more willing to pay for a good network experience. Most of the products in this range have game acceleration functions, and e-sports, mobile games, and console players are the main consumers in this range; in addition, the router choices of large-sized apartments and villa users such as mesh sets and power line products are also in this range.

During the epidemic, consumers are more demanding about home WiFi due to applications such as playing mobile games, watching TV series, video chatting, taking online classes, and teleworking. Compared with the negative emotions caused by lag, consumers are more inclined to spend money to buy a good router to ensure smooth network applications.

4. Who is the hot item?

Top 10 wireless router products in China in the first half of 2020

Among the top 10 wireless router models that attracted the most attention in the Chinese wireless router market in the first half of 2020, Huawei Router AX3 took the lead with an attention rate of 8.9%, far exceeding subsequent products, dominating the list and becoming the hottest wireless router product in the first half of the year.

Huawei, which has the highest market attention, has three products on the list. Together with Honor's two products, Huawei routers dominate the list with five products. TP-LINK has three products on the list, while Tenda and Asus each have one product on the list.

Industry Analysis and Outlook

What will the domestic wireless router market look like in the second half of the year?

WiFi 6 has exploded in the first half of 2020 and will continue to be strong in the second half. New network applications that emerged during the epidemic, such as remote video conferencing, remote work, and online classes, will continue to exist, and the demand for WiFi 6 routers will continue to grow. In September or October, new mobile phones from Apple and Huawei will be released, which will usher in a wave of phone replacements and further promote the upgrade of WiFi 6 routers.

Home broadband has been further accelerated, starting at 300M and capped at 1000M. As high-speed broadband becomes more popular among families, the slogan of building a "three-gigabit" network was proposed on Telecom Day. Among them, WiFi 6 routers will take on the responsibility of providing gigabit home wireless broadband. Major operators and manufacturers have already produced WiFi 6 customized optical modems, which will further promote the popularization of WiFi 6 routers.

Are you planning to switch to a WiFi 6 router in the second half of the year? Let’s wait for the year-end summary!