{"id":187213,"date":"2025-10-09T04:37:07","date_gmt":"2025-10-09T04:37:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/187213\/"},"modified":"2025-10-09T04:37:07","modified_gmt":"2025-10-09T04:37:07","slug":"move-over-apple-little-genius-smartwatches-captivate-millions-of-children-in-china","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/187213\/","title":{"rendered":"Move over, Apple: Little Genius smartwatches captivate millions of children in China"},"content":{"rendered":"<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">One recent Saturday afternoon in Shanghai, a 10-year-old girl \u2013 glasses perched on her nose, her pink T-shirt tucked into a purple skirt \u2013 led her parents into a Little Genius store. Returning to school after the summer break, she was eager for a new smartwatch and had only one brand in mind.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">\u201cWe checked out Huawei and Xiaomi, but my daughter insisted on getting Little Genius,\u201d the mother told the sales staff.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Known locally as Xiaotiancai and abroad as Imoo, Little Genius may be unfamiliar to most adult consumers in the global wrist-worn device market, dominated by giants like Apple, Samsung Electronics and Garmin. But in China, the brand has captured a niche market, driven by tech-savvy children and parents looking for an age-appropriate smartphone alternative.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">In the second quarter of this year, Little Genius ranked fourth among smartwatch brands worldwide, grabbing 7 per cent of the market \u2013 ahead of Samsung, but behind Huawei, Apple and Xiaomi, according to Counterpoint Research.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">In the children\u2019s segment, however, Little Genius was unrivalled with more than 48 per cent of the global market share in the first half, up from over 27 per cent in 2021.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"A Little Genius store in Shanghai. Photo: Wency Chen\" data-qa=\"BaseImage-handleRenderImage-StyledImage\" class=\"e1gf69pb2 css-6ikqhs e445x7d0\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/1a25a08c-8c2a-4d6b-90c6-f1bc8700a04e_7833f201.jpg\" title=\"A Little Genius store in Shanghai. Photo: Wency Chen\"\/>A Little Genius store in Shanghai. Photo: Wency Chen<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">\u201cIt first meets parents\u2019 core demand for safety \u2013 offering real-time location, voice and video calls,\u201d said Bai Shenghao, a senior analyst at Counterpoint. \u201cIt also gives children their own social functions, with interfaces that match their tastes.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"One recent Saturday afternoon in Shanghai, a 10-year-old girl \u2013 glasses perched on her nose, her pink T-shirt&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":187214,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[304,891,82401,786,4258,4755,51673,82399,82400,82402,30608,5752,86,56,54,55,82398,16608],"class_list":{"0":"post-187213","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-gadgets","8":"tag-apple","9":"tag-china","10":"tag-counterpoint-research","11":"tag-gadgets","12":"tag-garmin","13":"tag-huawei","14":"tag-imoo","15":"tag-ivy-yang","16":"tag-little-genius","17":"tag-runto-technology","18":"tag-samsung-electronics","19":"tag-shanghai","20":"tag-technology","21":"tag-uk","22":"tag-united-kingdom","23":"tag-unitedkingdom","24":"tag-wavelet-strategy","25":"tag-xiaomi"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/187213","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=187213"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/187213\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/187214"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=187213"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=187213"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=187213"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}