vivo unveiled iQOO 8 series on August 17th, 2021, in China. The new flagship series carries the vendor’s ambition to grab more shares in premium online segment.
iQOO was born as a sub-brand of vivo in February 2019. Targeting to young male users and sold mainly via online channel, iQOO has enjoyed robust growth in the past two years. According to our latest research, iQOO has grown as the second largest volume contributor for vivo, slightly behind its mass-market-oriented Y series.
iQOO 8 series is the new hero line-up both for iQOO and for vivo. It is competitive by hardware specification in premium segment, especially iQOO 8 Pro which spots the latest technology available in the market. In addition to Qualcomm 888+ 5G chipset, LPDDR 5 RAM and UFS 3.1 ROM, iQOO 8 Pro comes with the industry-leading E5 AMOLED display from Samsung, 3D ultrasonic fingerprint scanner from Qualcomm, a bulky triple rear camera module (50MP + 48MP + 16MP), 4500mAh battery, as well as 120W fast-charging and 50W fast wireless charging capability.
The retail price of iQOO 8 Pro hit RMB 5999 (USD 925) this time, a record high for this young sub-brand. With RMB 3799 (USD 585) as the starting price, iQOO 8 series will compete head-to-head with Xiaomi’s Mix series and Number series, OPPO OnePlus’ Number series, Honor’s Magic series, and realme’s GT series in online premium segment. The premium segment in Android camp is experiencing intensified competition, especially in China, where all major vendors are pushing hard to seize the opportunities from Huawei’s fallout.
iQOO 8 and iQOO 8 Pro will be first available in China on August 24th and August 26th, 2021, respectively. We expect the models will hit more vivo’s overseas markets in the following months.
We are impressed by the new iQOO 8 series and consider it has enhanced vivo’s premium offering and will help vivo’s momentum in online channel. This in turn will solidify the vendor’s top five position in global smartphone market. For more insight about the vendor, WSS client are welcomed to access our latest quarter review on vivo via this link.
