Dongguan's 2025 Population Growth Ranks Second in China; 2026 H1 GDP Overtakes Foshan

In 2025, Dongguan's permanent population rose to 10.8004 million, an increase of 229,600, ranking second among Chinese cities, behind only Shenzhen. In the first half of 2026, the total market capitalization of Dongguan's 64 A-share listed companies exceeded 1.4 trillion yuan, up 76.25% in the half-year period, ranking second among trillion-yuan GDP cities in market cap growth, behind Wuhan's 80.99%.

From 2023 to 2024, Dongguan's GDP growth once ranked at the bottom among comparable cities. In 2023, the city's value-added industrial output above designated size was 517.100 billion yuan, down 1.9% year on year; total exports were 846.09 billion yuan, down 8.9%. The economy gradually recovered in 2024 and 2025, but growth remained below the national average. In the first quarter of 2026, Dongguan's GDP grew 5%, matching the national average. In the first half, GDP reached 642.729 billion yuan, with real growth of 5.1%, 0.4 percentage points above the national average.

In the first quarter of 2026, Foshan's GDP was 292.314 billion yuan, down 2.4% year on year, with real growth of -2.4% and nominal growth of -3.91%, a decrease of 11.881 billion yuan from the first quarter of 2025. This was Foshan's third negative GDP growth, following the first quarter of 2024 and the full year of 2025. With one rising and the other falling, Dongguan overtook Foshan for the first time in history to become the third-largest economy in Guangdong.

From January to May 2026, Foshan's fixed-asset investment fell 40.6% year on year, and real estate development investment fell 37.6%. Total retail sales of consumer goods were 169.986 billion yuan, down 0.4%. During the same period, Foshan's total imports and exports were 257.54 billion yuan, up 10.1%, with exports of 199.66 billion yuan, up 8.8%.

In the first half of 2026, Dongguan's value-added industrial output above designated size grew 6.9% year on year, with electronic information manufacturing up 8.4% and electrical machinery and equipment manufacturing up 11.3%. Advanced manufacturing and high-tech manufacturing value-added output rose 7.4% and 9.4% respectively, 0.5 and 2.5 percentage points faster than the overall industrial growth. Integrated circuit output increased 37.0%, industrial robot output 35.0%, and mobile phone output 17.7%. Fixed-asset investment grew 7.3%, or 14.4% excluding real estate development investment. Total retail sales of consumer goods were 222.673 billion yuan, up 1.4%. Total imports and exports were 815.2 billion yuan, up 8.82%, with exports of 490 billion yuan, up 7.47%.

Dongguan has 220,000 industrial enterprises, including 14,000 above designated size, second only to Shenzhen nationwide. Its manufacturing sector covers 34 industrial categories and more than 60,000 products, forming pillars such as a trillion-yuan new-generation electronic information industry, a 500-billion-yuan electrical machinery and equipment industry, and a hundred-billion-yuan new materials industry. The secondary industry accounts for more than 55% of GDP, ranking first among trillion-yuan cities. In 2024, its above-scale industrial output ranked seventh nationally. According to the fifth economic census, Dongguan had 6.788 million employed persons in enterprises (excluding self-employed), with employment accounting for 64.7% of the total population, ranking third nationwide. Official data show that Dongguan has 405 urban villages, whose rental housing accounts for 80% of the city's rental stock and can accommodate more than 7 million people.

Dongguan is home to more than 4,000 toy manufacturers and over 1,500 upstream and downstream supporting enterprises, making it the country's largest toy export base. More than one-third of the world's anime derivatives and about 85% of China's designer toys are produced in Dongguan. The city is pushing the designer toy industry to extend from original equipment manufacturing to IP design, original development, and brand operations, and plans to build a hundred-billion-yuan designer toy and animation industry cluster.