On January 14, China released its December and full-year 2025 foreign-trade figures.
       For the year, merchandise trade reached USD 634 billion, up 3.2 % year-on-year. Exports withstood headwinds and rose 5.5 % to USD 377 billion.

       In 2025 China remained the world’s largest goods trader for another year, with total imports and exports topping RMB 45 trillion—a record high and the ninth consecutive annual increase. The country has also been the world’s second-largest import market for 17 years running.

   Method>Difficulties  

       Emerging markets have become a key engine of China’s export growth.
       In 2025 China traded with 249 countries and territories; imports and exports rose in 190-plus of them.

       Tariff wars have no winners. China’s 2025 shipments to the United States fell 19.5 % to RMB 3.0 trillion—the steepest drop on record, exceeding the 13 % decline in 2023 and the contractions seen during the 2019 trade war and the 2009 Lehman crisis.

       Even so, China remains the United States’ third-largest export market and third-largest supplier, while the United States is still China’s top export destination and third-largest import source—a reminder that China-U.S. trade is fundamentally win-win.

With U.S. sales sliding, Chinese firms rushed into other markets. Exports to the EU and Belt & Road economies accelerated sharply.

• 2025 exports to the EU: RMB 4.0 trillion, up 9 %

Sales to Germany, Italy and other major EU economies grew at double-digit rates

• 2025 exports to Viet Nam, Thailand, Indonesia and the rest of ASEAN, and to Africa, posted high growth

Africa: RMB 1.61 trillion, up 26.5 %—more than half the value of China’s U.S. exports

• Belt & Road partners: +11.2 %

• ASEAN: +14 %

Shipments to Belt & Road countries now exceed half of China’s total exports. A December surge in sales to this bloc offset that month’s U.S. decline and lifted the headline growth rate. The trade-diversion effect is still gathering momentum, cushioning the widening drop in U.S.-bound shipments.

   Which products are driving the foreign trade market beyond expectations   

High-tech products:
In 2025, exports of high-tech products rose 13.2 % year-on-year and contributed 2.4 percentage points to overall export growth. Special-purpose equipment, high-end machine tools and industrial robots gained 20.6 %, 21.5 % and 48.7 % respectively. For the first time, China exported more industrial robots than it imported, becoming a net exporter of the product.
Optical transceiver modules used in high-end graphics cards increased by nearly 60 %, while large transformers and storage batteries—meeting robust global data-centre power demand—grew 18.8 %.

Green products:

• Green energy: lithium-battery and wind-turbine exports rose 26.2 % and 48.7 % respectively

• Green mobility: electric motorcycles/bicycles +18.1 %; electric railway locomotives +27.1 %

• Green production: industrial-gas purification units +17.3 %; electric forklift trucks +5.2 %