Xiaomi Redmi 1S is the 4th best-selling smartphone -- in the world!

Apple might be hoping to make big inroads in China with the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus, but it has some stiff opposition standing in its way.

Xiaomi is a Chinese smartphone maker known for producing powerful yet affordable handsets. While its name might mean little to you, Xiaomi is now the world’s fifth largest smartphone vendor and the company’s devices are so popular in China that they account for 14 percent of the smartphone shipments in that country, easily beating the likes of Samsung, Lenovo, and Huawei. One of its handsets, the Xiaomi Redmi 1S, is so successful it now ranks as the world's 4th best-selling smartphone.

Think about that for a moment. According to new research from Strategy Analytics’ Country Share Tracker (CST), in Q2 2014, the Redmi 1S was, by volume, more popular than most of the other smartphones in the world, which underscores just how big the China market has become. The Redmi 1S is insanely popular in India too, with 40,000 handsets selling out in just 4.2 seconds in flash sale held on Flipkart earlier this month.

Xiaomi has only been producing smartphones for four years but has achieved incredible success due to its willingness to sell devices for very low margins, and engage in flash sales to gain market share.

The Redmi 1S is a dual SIM smartphone with a 4.7-inch IPS LCD display offering a resolution of 720 by 1280 pixels. It's 9.9mm thick, weighs 158g, and is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 chipset, coupled with an Adreno 305 graphics processor and 1GB of RAM. It comes with 8GB of internal storage, expandable to 64GB via a microSD card. Camera-wise it offers an 8MP rear shooter and a front-facing 1.6MP camera.

The phone has a 2,050 mAh battery and connectivity options include 3G, Wi-Fi a/b/g/n, Bluetooth, GPS and GLONASS. It runs a custom version of Android 4.3 Jelly Bean.

All for the equivalent of around $100.

Xiaomi says it plans to attack the North American market starting next year.