Booming AC Sales in Europe Show How Cool Chinese Innovation

Chinese air conditioners (ACs) have been selling like hotcakes in Europe, making headlines worldwide. Data shows that from January to May this year, China's exports of air conditioners to Western European countries such as France, the Netherlands, and Belgium doubled compared to the same period last year; in June alone, exports to Europe surged 72.8 percent year on year.

The surge in sales of Chinese air conditioners and other "cooling essentials" across Europe is a microcosm of China's manufacturing going global. The high demand for Chinese air conditioners in Europe presents another vivid testament to China's innovative resilience.

China exported nearly 28 billion USD worth of air conditioners in 2025 and accounted for around 40 percent of global exports, according to data compiled by the Observatory of Economic Complexity, underscoring the country's dominance in the global supply chain. Other Chinese-made cooling products — from fan-equipped sun hats to handheld fans and cooling blankets — have also gained immense popularity overseas.

According to The Wall Street Journal, Europeans are trying to stay cool, which is a boon for Chinese household-appliance makers such as Midea, Haier and Gree that have been trying to expand their global market share.

Geoffroy Boulard, the mayor of the 17th arrondissement of Paris, recently purchased 50 China-made air conditioners for local schools, where temperatures have been soaring. The temperature in one building exceeded 110 degree Fahrenheit (43.33 degrees Celsius), according to a video he posted on X recently.

According to CNBC, a website built by German software developer Adrian Kübel to track real-time inventory of Midea units across the country went viral on social media and showed the air conditioners were mostly sold out.

Around 20 percent of households in Europe have air conditioning, far below the nearly 90 percent penetration rate in the U.S., according to the International Energy Agency. That offers further opportunity for appliance makers, in particular those of portable units as the continent's politicians and regulators get bogged down in the debate over if and how to allow the installation of the bulkier wall-mounted units. This is a gap Midea and Asian home appliance makers Samsung and Mitsubishi Electric are all racing to close.

None of Europe's five best-selling air-conditioner brands have EU ownership. Haier, Gree, and Midea — all Chinese — together held about 32 percent of the European AC market by retail volume in 2025, according to Euromonitor International.

Midea's air-conditioning design illustrates engineering tailored to overcome Europe's fragmented and layered regulatory and market barriers.

Its PortaSplit outdoor unit clips onto a window bracket, needs no drilling, and is classified as furniture rather than a fixture — sidestepping fa？ade modification bans in cities like Paris. Its refrigerant charge is also capped at 1.99 kilograms, just under France's two-kilogram limit.

Bloomberg News quoted analyst Jeff Zhang as saying, "Overall, we expect strong demand for window-mounted air conditioners to drive year-on-year export sales growth for major Chinese manufacturers in summer months." Zhang forecast a "meaningful" boost in second- and third-quarter revenue growth.

Chinese products' high usage convenience, affordable pricing and installation cost savings will structurally benefit key manufacturers and consumers in the long run, according to Zhang. "This may become recurring if global warming persists."

Source: Science and Technology Daily