In the second half of 2026, a fundamental shift is underway in how home appliance brands compete. Instead of betting on single blockbuster products, leading brands are pivoting toward whole-home smart scenarios as the core of brand value competition.
From "Selling Hero Products" to "Selling Scenarios" The home appliance industry is undergoing a strategic migration—moving from "polishing one product at a time" to systematic launches of multi-product, even whole-home solutions. This shift is clearly visible across the top players:
Gree is transforming itself from "selling air conditioners" to "selling healthy homes." Under the unified scenario brand "Dong Mingzhu Healthy Home," Gree offers integrated solutions covering "air, water, and diet," using its proprietary large model to make appliances shift from passive "listening to commands" to proactively "understanding needs."
Haier Smart Home operates a dual-brand strategy with "Three-Winged Bird" and "Casarte." The former leverages HomeGPT to target pre-installation and integrated kitchen-cabinet solutions, while the latter captures premium replacement demand through high-end collections such as Zhijing, Languang, and Cangjia. Casarte's suite-based product mix now accounts for 75% of its total, up 26.5 percentage points year-on-year.
Midea deploys a "group-army" approach across its extensive brand portfolio. Its main "Meixiangjia" suite connects four key living scenarios through an AI assistant, while the premium COLMO brand offers Tulin and Xinxiang suites with proactive sensing and decision-making capabilities. Combined with Toshiba and Little Swan in niche segments, Midea has built a complete coverage from mass market to premium.
TCL leverages its "screen + AI" strategy to integrate air conditioners, refrigerators, washer-dryers, and TVs into whole-home systems controlled via voice, using its strength in display technology to drive white goods adoption in the central air conditioning market.
Brand Value Shifts from "Hardware" to "Experience" The
2026 China Premium Home Appliance Value Growth White Paper notes that the industry has entered a new cycle where stock-market competition coexists with consumption upgrading. Premium, intelligent, and suite-based products continue to grow, while commoditized, low-value-added products are trapped in price wars. The competitive logic is shifting from price to value—companies need to move from "functional" to "understanding the user."
Premium brands have validated this trajectory. In its first decade, Casarte never prioritized scale in its performance metrics, choosing instead to define the brand through product excellence. Twenty years on, Casarte now commands 71%, 80%, and 45% market share in the above-RMB 15,000 segments for refrigerators, washing machines, and air conditioners respectively, with brand value growing by over RMB 15 billion annually. Its AI Eye 2.0 technology pushes appliances from command-response to proactive service—kitchen hoods recognize cooking states and automatically adjust heat, washing machines identify fabrics and recommend care programs, and air conditioners sense human presence to avoid direct airflow.
Brand Globalization: Moving Beyond OEM The export side is equally showing a brand upgrade trend. In the first half of 2026, China's home appliance exports reached RMB 360.96 billion, with self-owned brands accounting for one-quarter and growing at 21.2% year-on-year. TVs, refrigerators, and washing machines all maintained double-digit export growth. Zhang Jianfeng, Secretary-General of the China Household Electric Appliance Commercial Association, commented that the rising share of self-owned brands means "Chinese companies are beginning to command brand premiums"—a strategic advantage against raw material price volatility and shipping costs.
The European market provides a particularly compelling example. Facing high installation costs and restrictions in historic buildings, Midea developed the PortaSplit portable air conditioner specifically for Europe, with first-half shipments exceeding 200,000 units—a year-on-year increase of over 200%. Haier's Expert series reduced installation time by 50%, while its HVAC business grew nearly 20% across Europe. Fu Jian, President of Midea International, noted that Midea is shifting from "a more export-volume-oriented model" to one that "places greater emphasis on self-owned brands, localized products, and long-term channel capabilities."
Bottom Line
Home appliance brand competition is entering a new phase: domestically, the move is from "hero products" to "scenario-based solutions"; globally, the shift is from "OEM" to "brand building." In a stock-market environment, brand value is no longer defined by technical specs and price tags alone—it comes down to whether a brand can deliver a tangible, trustworthy smart living experience that users can rely on across their entire home.
