Major Chinese e-commerce platforms have launched a sweeping round of discounts ahead of Singles Day, the country's largest online shopping festival. JD.com held a limited-quantity flash sale offering the iPhone 16 Pro, Dell laptops and Sony cameras for 1 yuan, or about 200 won.
Alibaba's Taobao and Tmall, JD.com and Douyin have all rolled out pre-sale promotions ahead of the Nov. 11 event, China's state-run English-language newspaper Global Times reported recently.
Launched by Alibaba in 2009, Singles Day began as a one-day discount event on Nov. 11 but has since expanded into an industry-wide promotional campaign running for nearly a month. Platforms are combining cash coupons, time-limited subsidies, pre-orders and government consumption-stimulus subsidies to drive purchases.
JD.com ran its special promotion from 8 p.m. on the 12th and 13th, allowing shoppers to buy select electronics for 1 yuan. Eligible products included the iPhone 16 Pro, Dell laptops and the Sony Alpha 7C camera. Tmall begins pre-sales on the 15th, while Douyin has joined the competition with live-commerce discounts and platform coupons.
Tmall has also dropped its previous requirement that shoppers buy multiple items to qualify for discounts, now offering markdowns on single-item purchases. Douyin has applied an immediate 15% discount to some products.
Home appliances and smartphones are drawing particular attention because platform discounts can be stacked with the Chinese government's trade-in subsidies for consumer goods, allowing companies to court shoppers with combined savings.
The festival will run through around Nov. 11, with the discount competition expected to peak between the evening of Nov. 10 and Nov. 11.
Hu Qimu, a professor at Huaqiao University, said the concentrated spending expected during Singles Day "can raise purchase conversion rates and ease the burden on logistics networks, which could help the long-term development of distribution and manufacturing." But he added that "the enthusiasm for Singles Day is not as strong as it was a few years ago," explaining that "as the event has stretched out over a longer period, there is less room to try new changes, and consumers have become more rational and no longer concentrate their purchases into a short window."
One consumer in Beijing said they are "shopping more rationally this year," adding: "I signed up for pre-orders for things I really need, and I'm carefully comparing prices before making a final purchase." The shopper also said they buy "only what is needed, not just because it's a shopping festival."