China Retail Sales Up 1.3% in H1 2026, New Energy Car Penetration Over 54%, State Council Approves 60 Trillion

In the first half of 2026, data from the National Bureau of Statistics showed that total retail sales of consumer goods and services grew by 2.7% year-on-year, with service retail sales up 5.3% and goods retail sales up 1.1%. Service consumption growth outpaced goods consumption by 4.2 percentage points. Total retail sales of consumer goods (excluding services) reached RMB 24.8722 trillion, up 1.3% year-on-year. In June, total retail sales of consumer goods were RMB 4.2691 trillion, up 1.0% year-on-year, reversing the 0.6% decline in May. Excluding the impact of automobiles, first-half retail sales of consumer goods were RMB 22.9034 trillion, up 2.8% year-on-year.

In terms of urban-rural structure, the rural market grew faster than urban areas. In the first half of the year, rural retail sales of consumer goods increased by 2.5% year-on-year, 1.3 percentage points higher than the urban growth rate. The share of county and township retail sales in total retail sales of consumer goods reached 39.2%, up 0.3 percentage points year-on-year.

In the goods consumption segment, green and smart consumption stood out. In the first half of the year, retail sales of new energy passenger vehicles reached 4.704 million units, with a penetration rate exceeding 54%. In the second quarter, the retail penetration rate of new energy passenger vehicles reached 62.4%. Driven by the trade-in policy, the subsidy scope was narrowed to six categories of high-energy-consuming household appliances meeting Grade 1 energy efficiency or water efficiency standards. Jiangsu included smart products such as clothes dryers, dishwashers, floor-sweeping robots, embodied intelligent robots, and electric wheelchairs in the subsidy scope. Guangdong added six categories of subsidized goods including smart displays, smart toilets, and age-appropriate respiratory assistive medical devices. In the first half of the year, retail sales of communications equipment by above-designated-size units increased by 14.4% year-on-year, retail sales of high-energy-efficiency home appliances grew by more than 30%, and retail sales of wearable smart devices such as smart glasses more than doubled.

In terms of service consumption, retail sales of services in the first half of the year increased by 5.3% year-on-year. In June, Yunnan Province allocated RMB 70 million in consumption vouchers focusing on cultural performances, cultural and creative products, and low-altitude cultural tourism products. Hunan released a four-season food tourism route 'Follow the Food to Xiangtan'. In the first half of the year, retail sales of travel consultation and rental, and cultural and sports leisure services grew by 11.3% and 10.4% respectively, while sales revenue from travel and entertainment services increased by 12.3% year-on-year. Among retail sales of goods by above-designated-size units, communications equipment rose 14.4%, tobacco and alcohol rose 13.2%, clothing, shoes, hats and knitwear rose 6.7%, cosmetics rose 6.3%, and beverages rose 6%. Transaction value on cultural and sports service platforms increased by 9.7% year-on-year, and sales revenue from immersive experience categories such as performing arts and museums grew by 28.3% and 24.6% respectively.

On July 13, the State Council officially approved the '15th Five-Year Plan' for Expanding Consumption, which sets a target of achieving total retail sales of consumer goods of approximately RMB 60 trillion by 2030. The growth rate of total retail sales of consumer goods in the first half of the year was 1.3%.