In 2014, China mobile internet users exceeded 553 million, representing 85.6% of total internet users. Further, reading on mobile has been the major method for users to read news online in China. China top 3 mobile news apps by downloads are Tencnet News, Today’s Headline and Netease News in the second half of 2014 according to Sootoo.com.
As of 5 Dec 2014 in China, Tencent News app ranked top by total number of downloads of 481.74 million, followed by Today the Headline and Netease news app. Sohu News mobile app achieved 100 million users by May 2014; but in August, Tencent News surpassed Sohu News becoming the best mobile news app by the number of unique visitors and MAU.
Tencent news app accounted for 33.9% market share in China mobile news app market, ranking top, followed by Today’s Headline (17.7%) and Netease News (13.2%). The market share of iFeng News, Sina News and Baidu News apps were all less than 5% as of 5 Dec 2014.
With rapid development of mobile internet, mobile and social elements will play more and more important role. Among all the mobile news apps in China, Tencent News app makes good use of China’s major social platforms like WeChat and QQ; it is favored by Chinese news app users.
According to mobile news app users’ ratings, Today’s Headline ranked top with a rating of 9.5, followed by iFeng News and Baidu News in H2 2014.
Nearly 70% mobile news app users reach news on mobile device while 9.5% on desktop in China in H2 2014.
44.9% mobile news app users read news at their leisure time while only 9.6% users use app when studying or working. Mobile device makes it possible for users to read online news at various scenarios nowadays.
Mobile news app users in China are mainly ones who are between 20 and 39 years old, accounting for 72% with an increase of 1 percentage point from the first half of 2014. China users who are concerned about online news have two features: firstly, they have high demand for the latest news; secondly, they are good at adapting to internet and internet-related products. See more about China internet users here.
Also read: China Education Mobile Apps Exceeded 70,000 in Nov 2014
