The report was presented on July 30 at the CDEC conference in Shanghai. This is the official industry data, compiled by the game committee of China’s CADPA association.
All figures in the report are given in yuan. Dollar conversions here and below use a rate of ~6.74 yuan per dollar as of mid-August 2026.
❗️CADPA counts revenue from Chinese platforms and Chinese developers. This data excludes foreign games not officially published in China.
Market
China’s domestic market in H1’26 was 188.45 billion yuan (~$27.9 billion), +12.17% YoY.
By June 2026, the country had 684 million players (+0.82% YoY). The audience is growing slowly, so the market’s growth came from higher revenue per user.
Chinese self-developed games earned 163.36 billion yuan (~$24.2 billion) domestically, up 16.31% YoY. They account for 86.7% of the domestic market, and they are growing noticeably faster than the market overall.
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Exports
Abroad, Chinese games earned $12.37 billion (+30.22% YoY). Both successful legacy projects and new releases are behind that figure.
Geographically, the main markets for Chinese mobile games have not changed: the US (32.31% of overseas revenue), Japan (14.05%), and South Korea (7.48%). Together, that is 53.84%.
Germany, the UK, and France together account for 10.14% of overseas revenue, and their share grew slightly.
By revenue, among the top 100 Chinese mobile games abroad, Strategy leads with 46.91% of revenue. Merge games are next (16.22%), followed by RPG (9.62%). Shooter is fourth at 8.31%.
Over the year, merge games added 9.74 percentage points of revenue share.
❗️Since the source is in Chinese, I’m not certain whether this means +9.74% YoY or +9.74 percentage points. Either way, the growth is substantial.
Platforms
Mobile games inside China earned 135.21 billion yuan (~$20.1 billion), up 7.9% YoY. That is 71.75% of the domestic market.
Among the top 100 mobile games by revenue, RPG is the most common genre (22% of the total), followed by Strategy (11%).
By revenue in that top 100, though, Shooter takes first place: 26.23% of all revenue, and it grew noticeably over the year. MOBA dropped to second (18.96% of all revenue), and RPG is third (14.35%).
PC client games earned 45.29 billion yuan (~$6.7 billion), up 27.92% YoY. The segment accounts for 24.03% of the market and is the second fastest-growing part of the domestic market after mini games. CADPA attributes the growth to cross-play between PC and mobile versions and strong results from several long-running projects.
❗️ PC client games in China are growing three and a half times faster than mobile. The market is much smaller in absolute terms, though.
Browser games earned 2.02 billion yuan (~$299 million), down 8.47% YoY. The decline has continued for several years.
Console games earned 961 million yuan (~$143 million), down 7.06% YoY. The main reason is the absence of hits on the scale of Black Myth: Wukong.
❗️This covers only official console sales inside China. Grey imports and purchases in foreign regions are not included, so the real figures are higher.
Games with esports disciplines earned 89.62 billion yuan (~$13.3 billion), up 11.12% YoY.
Anime games earned 13.27 billion yuan (~$1.97 billion), down 8.97% YoY. Several large projects saw revenue decline, and new releases could not cover the gap.
Casual mobile games earned 18.21 billion yuan (~$2.7 billion), +10.74% YoY. In-app purchases accounted for 67% of all revenue, and advertising for 33%.
Mini games earned 31.66 billion yuan (~$4.7 billion), up 36.01% YoY. That is the fastest-growing segment of the Chinese gaming market.
Within mini games, in-app purchases brought in 21.14 billion yuan (+38.12%), and advertising 10.52 billion yuan (+31.94%). The split barely changed vs. H1’25: 66.8% IAP revenue against 33.2% advertising.
Board games appear in the report for the first time. The segment earned 3.87 billion yuan (~$574 million) and grew slightly, up 4.03% YoY.
Digital board games brought in 1.997 billion yuan (51.6% of total revenue), and physical ones brought in 1.87 billion yuan (48.4%).