Why Is AliExpress So Cheap?

If you’re not familiar with AliExpress, here’s a quick primer: it’s a huge online retailer owned by The Alibaba Group, a multi-billion dollar corporation that started as a business-to-business buying and selling portal. It has since expanded to business-to-consumer, consumer-to-consumer, cloud computing, and payment services, as well.

AliExpress is Alibaba’s online consumer marketplace for international buyers (while TaoBao is for China). It allows small businesses in China to sell to customers all over the world. Just like Amazon, you can find just about anything there. Unlike Amazon, all of the sellers on AliExpress are a third party: AliExpress itself does not sell anything. They just provide the marketplace.

To give you an idea of just how big Alibaba is, they reported over $25 billion in sales on Singles’ Day (November 11) 2017.

If you browse some of the products on AliExpress, you’ll probably notice right away that many of the prices are really low. Why is this? There are two different distinct possibilities, both of which you’ll find in abundance on the site.

First, there’s the possibility that you’re buying directly from a manufacturer, which reduces the cost of selling to you. Costs for production in China are quite a bit lower than in other countries. The lax enforcement of intellectual property laws may also contribute.

A lot of electronics (like this 4WD Arduino robot we built) have fantastic prices on AliExpress, because they’re made in China and you can buy them direct, avoiding the retail markup added by a middle-man.

The second possibility for an item being extremely cheap is that its either counterfeit or fraudulent (or semi-fraudulent, as in the case of the GooPhone15). China is known as a hotbed of counterfeit production, and AliExpress is no exception.

You can get all sorts of counterfeit items there, from electronics to clothing. Some sellers have also been known to defraud buyers by tricking them into paying before they receive an item and then disappearing with the money. If you cannot get discount, please check below reasons:

1. A limited amount of discounts are available. Distributed on a first come, first served basis, you may not get discount when it is out of stock.
2. Check the deadline of discount. As we always have various activities on AliExpress, you can join other activities to get coupons and discounts.
3. Check if you meet the minimum spending requirements. For example, if it shows "US $7.00 off per US $89.00", it means you can get the US $7 discount only when your order value is over US $89.

Kind Note: Currently, Russian and Spanish sellers do not accept AliExpress discount.

If you don't find the coupon under your account, please check below possible reasons:

1. Check whether the campaign is still valid. It may has not yet started or already expired.
2. Check whether the coupon is issued based on first come, first served basis. The coupon may already run out and you can try earlier in next round.

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