China’s industrial capacity utilization rate declined to 73.1% in the third quarter of 2026, down from 74.6% in the same period of the previous year. The decrease reflected weaker output across all three major sectors: the mining industry (69.5% vs. 72.5% in Q3 2025), the manufacturing industry (73.3% vs. 74.8%), and the electricity, heat, gas, and water supply sector (72.6% vs. 74.3%).
Among key industries, automobile manufacturing posted the steepest drop in utilization (66.2% vs. 73.3%), followed by ferrous metal smelting and rolling (75.1% vs. 80.1%) and non-ferrous metal smelting and rolling (73.5% vs. 77.8%). In contrast, the specialized equipment manufacturing industry (77.7% vs. 79.9%) remained one of the relatively stronger performers.
On a quarter-on-quarter basis, overall industrial capacity utilization stood at 73% in the third quarter, a more than two-year low, but edged up by 0.1 percentage point compared with the second quarter.
