Nvidia China AI-chip market share falls as Huawei gains ground
China's data-centre AI chip market is shifting as export restrictions reshape competition between foreign and domestic suppliers. Nvidia's share falls to 34% in the first half of 2026, while Huawei narrows the gap in a market that IDC says continues to expand overall.
Highlights
- Nvidia shipped 678,000 AI accelerators in China from January to June, down 44% year-on-year, while Huawei shipped 572,000 units, up from over 300,000.
- Tighter U.S. export controls and Beijing's push for domestic alternatives have cut Nvidia's market share and boosted Huawei's to 28% of China's AI accelerator market.
- IDC projects total accelerator shipments in China will rise 19% in 2024 despite a 9% drop in GPU shipments, reflecting robust but shifting demand.
Shipment trends in China's AI accelerator market
As reported by Reuters, an IDC report seen by the news agency shows Nvidia shipped 678,000 AI accelerators in China from January through June, down 44% from a year earlier. The research firm says Huawei shipped 572,000 units, up from more than 300,000 a year earlier, giving it a 28% share of the overall market.AI accelerators are specialised chips used to train and run AI models. IDC says Nvidia's declining share reflects tighter U.S. export controls that limit the range of products the chipmaker can sell in China.
Policy pressure and industry impact
Washington has restricted China's access to Nvidia's most powerful AI chips, while Beijing is promoting domestic alternatives and requiring Chinese companies to seek approval to import compliant Nvidia chips.Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang has repeatedly criticised the export curbs, saying the policy forces a U.S. company to cede China's $50 billion AI chip market to Huawei. IDC says competition is shifting from the performance of a single chip to system-level capabilities, including how effectively chips operate in larger computing clusters.
IDC expects total accelerator shipments in China to grow 19% this year, even as GPU shipments fall 9%, pointing to continued demand but a changing product and supplier mix in the sector.
Our earlier article on China’s AI chip supply crunch explained that Chinese tech groups are facing a widening computing-power gap as AI model and data-centre build-outs accelerate. We noted that to bridge shortages, companies have been buying large volumes of export-compliant Nvidia gaming and workstation GPUs and, in some cases, securing overseas GPU capacity while domestic AI chip production scales up.
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