Shanghai retains crown as city with the most coffee stores

A report stated that Shanghai presently has 8,530 coffee stores, an increase of 673 from last year and accounting for 6.4 percent of the national total. [Photo provided to chinadaily.com.cn]

Shanghai is once again the city with the highest number of coffee shops in the world, according to the 2023 China Urban Coffee Development Report that was released during the ongoing Coffee Culture Week.

Compiled by CBNData, a research arm of the Yicai media group, on-demand service platform Meituan, and the cultural innovation and youth development research institute of Shanghai Jiao Tong University, the report stated that the city presently has 8,530 coffee stores, an increase of 673 from last year and accounting for 6.4 percent of the national total.

Guangzhou, Beijing, Chengdu, and Shenzhen are the next four cities in terms of the number of coffee stores in China.

The report also pointed out that the scale of China's coffee industry was 200.7 billion yuan ($140.6 billion) in 2022. The scale is expected to expand to 369.3 billion yuan in 2025.

Freshly ground coffee has the fastest growth rate in China - it grew by 28 percent year-on-year in 2022. Instant and ready-to-drink coffee has the lowest growth rate (6.73 percent).

According to Meituan data, the online coffee delivery market has also grown rapidly in recent years with a compound growth rate of 133 percent from 2021 to 2023.

Despite the surge in consumption in recent years, China's annual per capita coffee consumption is just 9 cups, a stark contrast to the figures from Scandinavian nations like Finland (1,080), Norway (891), and Iceland (810) - an indication that there is still more room for growth.

This year's coffee week will run till June 2.