China’s biggest shopping festival is here, and it’s not a coincidence that it’s also the world’s biggest shopping event. To give you a scale of how massive the Singles Day (also known as Double Eleven) event is — in 2020 alone, the total sales during this shopping festival reached 498 billion yuan ($78 billion). In comparison, the Black Friday weekend sale in the US generated only around $22 billion in the same year. 

Undoubtedly, China’s massive population is to credit for these humongous figures, but there’s no denying that new-age interactive sales techniques like live stream commerce and a rapid expansion in the country’s logistics network (nearly 3 billion parcels were shipped between Nov 11-16 across China in 2020) has magnified the scale of this shopping event.

History of Singles Day Festival in China

Although Singles Day started off as a celebration of bachelors, today, it’s much more than that. 

The concept of celebrating the ‘single life’ started gaining traction in the college campuses of 90s China. Eventually, this idea spread across the country via the internet and other media. November 11 is celebrated as Singles Day due to its numerical significance. The date consists of four ‘1’ wherein ‘1’ stands for a ‘single’ person. So November 11 i.e. 11/11 represents four singles together.

But China’s Singles day had nothing to do with shopping until 2009 when Alibaba decided to popularize this day with a huge shopping event, much like the Black Friday in the US. Within a span of a few years, Singles Day went from the biggest shopping festival in China to the world’s biggest shopping spree, dwarfing big international shopping events like Black Friday and Cyber Monday, combined.

And, what was initially a 24-hour shopping window on November 11 has now expanded into a two to three week sales event. And it’s not just Alibaba,but all major retailers across China like JD.com, Pinduoduo, and Suning, participate in this mega sales festival.

Double Eleven in Numbers

To understand the massive scale of this shopping event, let’s take a quick look at some key stats over the past few years.

I mentioned that Singles Day was many times bigger than Black Friday and Cyber Monday combined. So, here’s a simple bar chart comparing Singles Day sales figures to Thanksgiving sales in the US from Statistica.

As you can see in the chart above, the rate at which Singles Day sales have grown is quite astonishing. In 2015, Alibaba generated GMV (Gross Merchandise Value) worth $14.3 billion during the event, but by 2019, this figure grew to $38.4 billion. And last year, Alibaba managed to nearly double this figure, generating a massive GMV of over $76 billion! This dwarfs the GMV of Thanksgiving weekend sales in the US, which was only around $22 billion in 2020. 

Singles Day has managed to break records every year, and last year was no exception. Let’s take a quick look at the key figures from the Singles Day festival in 2020. 

Singles Day 2020

2020 (Nov 1 – 11) was the biggest Singles Day event till date for Alibaba and China, breaking all previous records.

• Last year between Nov 1 to 11, Alibaba alone generated around $78.1 billion in GMV (RMB 498.2 billion). Alibaba’s rival, JD.com booked around $42.47 billion in GMV (RMB 271.5 billion yuan) during the event.
• To give you some context, US’ thanksgiving weekend sales generated around $22 billion in GMV in 2020.
• During the first 11 days of the Double Eleven event, couriers processed and shipped over 3.9 billion parcels in China. A further 2.9 billion parcels were delivered between Nov. 11 – 16. 
• Alibaba’s logistics arm used more than 3000 charter flights and cargo ships to bring goods into China for this event last year.
  

The big 11/11 sale for 2021 is yet to kick off, but here’s what we know about the event so far. 

Singles Day 2021 – What to Expect?

This year’s Double 11 shopping event is expected to be Alibaba’s largest to date, with over 290,000 participating brands and more than 14 million discount deals available to the consumers. The mega sale event is expected to cater to over 900 million consumers.

There were some important changes made to the Double eleven sales event this year. 

1. The Double 11 sale event was held in two phases.
2. The first phase will start from November 1 to 3 (pre-sale starts from October 20), and the second will be on November 11, which is the day of the main event.
3. Another key change this year was the timing of the sale. Unlike previous years, wherein the pre-sales started at 0:00 AM, this year, retailers kicked off both the stages of pre-sale at 8 PM. So shoppers no longer had to stay up late to snap up their favorite products.
4. Green and eco-friendly products also got more attention this year. 

This year’s Double Eleven is already showing promise of becoming the largest sales event in history. A longer sales window for customers along with a longer list of brands participating in the event should ensure that it turns out to be much bigger than 2020. 

In the past two weeks alone, we’ve seen record-breaking sales figures from different brands. 

• More than 20,000 customers bought green home appliances in the first two hours of sale on Oct. 20, 2021, which reportedly helped save 300 tons of carbon emissions.
• Over US$1.7 billion worth of goods were sold by a celebrity host in just 12 hours of his live-streaming session at the start of the 11/11 sale.
• Shoppers bought iPhones worth 300 million yuan ($47 million) within a second after the sales kicked off on Nov 1. In just four minutes, the total iPhone sales during Singles Day exceeded the iPhone sales generated in an entire day in 2020. 
• Xiaomi sold products worth 7 billion yuan ($1.93 billion) on the first day of the Double Eleven sale. This included over 500,000 units of the Redmi Note 11 series alone. 

Singles Day not only generates massive sales for brands, but also indicates products that are gaining popularity among customers. So the first two weeks in November are among the most important periods for retailers in China. 

How can you participate in Double Eleven?

If you feel you are missing out on the fun, don’t worry as Alibaba’s international retail arm, Aliexpress has its own 11/11 sales event. While it’s not as big as the event in China, you’ll still find plenty of good deals and discount coupons on a wide variety of products this week. 

If you live in South East Asia, you can also participate in the local version of 11.11 events from retailers like Shopee and Lazada.

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China’s double 11 sales festival, also known as Singles’ day, is by far the biggest shopping festival globally. The 11-day festival eclipses AMazon’s Prime day and both Black Friday and Cyber Monday in terms of sales. Despite the coronavirus pandemic, this year’s edition turned out to be a big hit. According to data released by Xiaomi, it raked in 14.3 billion yuan (~$2.1 billion USD) during the 11 days shopping spree. Compared to 6.1 billion yuan (around 920 million USD) during the same period last year, this year’s revenue represents a whopping 134% increase YoY.

From November 1st to 11th, Xiaomi was able to set a number of new records. Xiaomi’s mobile phones, smart TV and other categories emerged as the top-sellers on multiple platforms such as JD.com, Tmall and Suning. Among them, Xiaomi smart TV brand ranked as number one on the TV category in both JD.com and Suning Tesco both ranked first in sales.

For this year’s Double 11, Xiaomi distributed 1 billion yuan in subsidies across all platforms which includes Xiaomi Mall, Xiaomi Home, Xiaomi Youpin, Tmall, JD.com, Suning and others. The subsidies and discounts cover all major Xiaomi product brands including smart TV, notebooks and AIoT products, covering all major brands under Xiaomi Category.

It is worthy of note that Xiaomi has been the top brand on Tmall’s singles’ day sales for seven consecutive years, that is since 2013.

Alibaba, the originator of the Singles’ Day shopping festival,  posted sales to the tune of a staggering $74 billion USD in its post-COVID-19 Singles’ Day shopping extravaganza, according to a report by Reuters.

Apart from Alibaba, rivals e-commerce firms such as JD.com Inc and Pinduoduo Inc as well as firms such as Douyin – the Chinese version of Beijing ByteDance Technology Co Ltd’s TikTok – also held Singles’ Day events. JD.com, which started promotions on Nov. 1, said it generated 271.5 billion yuan (~$40.9 billion USD) in trade over the same period.

UP NEXT: Xiaomi XiaoAI Speaker Art Battery Edition launched for 399 yuan ($59)

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One of the world’s biggest online shopping bonanza, which is held in China on 11th November every year, called Double 11 or Singles’ Day sale, kicked off today at midnight in China and impressive sales numbers are now being revealed.

As per the report coming from SCMP, Alibaba Group Holding managed to sell products worth 372.3 billion yuan or $56.3 billion in the 10 days leading up to the main event. So far, it has generated sales worth $38.4 billion today, i.e. 11th November.

Do note that the numbers mentioned above are just for the sales generated through the platform owned by Alibaba. The reason behind such massive numbers is that the sales started early this year, from 1st November. Also, many shoppers are now preferring to make their purchases online because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The report also mentions that Alibaba is claiming this year’s Singles’ Day to cover over two million new products on the platform — twice the number compared to last year. The company is also claiming that transactions per second peaked at 583,000 this year.

EDITOR’S PICK: Qualcomm reportedly gets license to supply chips to Huawei, P50 series could use Snapdragon chips

Alibaba also says that within 111 minutes of sales kicking off on 1st November, around 100 brands managed to sell products worth 100 million yuan. On the other hand, JD.com claims that its sales on 1st November were 90 percent higher compared to last year. The company’s transaction volume also reached 200 billion yuan and that is just through the first 10 minutes on 11th November.

Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, e-commerce transactions have increased in China. As per the report from the Ministry of Commerce, China’s online retail sales reached 5.15 trillion yuan in the first half of the year, representing a rise of 7.3 percent compared to the same period last year.

If you want to take a look at some of the most interesting and best deals during the Singles’ Day (Double 11) sale in China, head over to our Double 11 deals page.

UP NEXT: Sony PlayStation 5 gaming console is selling at three times its retail price in China due to supply shortage

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Huawei‘s sub-brand Honor has announced that the brand was the top Singles Day performer in terms of sales volume and revenue under the Smartphone category on two of China’s biggest e-commerce platforms — Tmall.com and JD.com.

The company further said that this is the third consecutive year of Honor’s sales supremacy during the Singles Day sales. The company also surpassed Apple in sales in both stores. The company’s latest premium device, Honor Magic 2, was the best selling smartphone in the 4000 to 5000 Yuan category, roughly price range of $580 to $720.

Commenting on this, George Zhao, President of Honor, said:

I’m thrilled that Honor achieved these unbeatable results even under what has become a tough situation for the global smartphone industry. Global smartphone shipments in Q3 2018 represented a 6% YoY decline, the Chinese smartphone market is also declining and was down 11% in the first half of 2018. Our strategy and undiminished efforts in R&D have ensured Honor bucked this global trend, especially in key areas of smartphone technology innovation such as AI, GPU Turbo, and our excellence in smartphone design.

The Singles Day sale also helped extend Honor’s growing influence into Southeast Asia. In Indonesia, Honor became a best seller in Mobile Category and Electronics Category at shopee.com, selling over 8,000 units within 80 minutes.

In India, the company revealed that during the Diwali sales, Honor recorded 300 percent year-on-year growth and sold over a million smartphones. It also said that the company’s fanbase increased by 32 percent.

Read More: Honor Magic 2 gets an update, replaces EMUI 9.0 with Magic UI 2.0

Meanwhile, the company is also set to launch its new smartphone, dubbed Honor 10 Lite at an event in Beijing on 21st November. At the event, Honor is expected to launch the Honor 10 Lite Supreme Edition as well.

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As the 11.11 Singles’s Day sale is over, now its time for companies to calculate the profits out of total sales. Well, as from initial findings it has been made clear that Apple iPhone was mostly sold at Singles’ Day sale. As according to the report, Alibaba has made sales worth $31 billion in a single day, most of the sales were led by Chinese firms like Huawei, Xiaomi, and others. Though, as per the new in-depth report, it is found that Apple led most of the sales in the smartphones category this year.

Actual number and facts are not present but it is confirmed that Apple’s iPhones were among the top smartphones which gathered a huge number of sales. Apple’s competitor, Samsung stood on 8th place in the number of sales, while Huawei managed to stand 2nd which is followed by Xiaomi at 3rd spot. Interestingly, Xiaomi gained $575 million sales in a single day, roughly converting to 3 billion yuan.

Unlike Apple, Xiaomi managed to rake up sales in the budget smartphone category. Even Xiaomi’s home products catered to its historical sales at this year’s Singles day event.

On the other hand, Samsung is struggling to find some good place in the Chinese market. The Korean giant is meddling with a continuous decline in China. Recently, a new report spilled some beans on the 1% market share of Samsung in China. It has considerably dipped from top most selling smartphone maker to the bottom. We think it has happened due to the competitive domestic players which are offering similar devices at much fewer prices.

• Read More: Apple introduces iPhone X display repair program for faulty units

It is a good news for Apple, as the Cupertino giant was seen struggling in making profits in Q3, 2018 around the Globe. We hope this would gradually help Apple to maintain good profit records.

Well, did you managed to buy a new Apple iPhone at Singles Day sale?

(Via, Source)

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What was supposed to be an insignificant day in the life of a regular Chinese bachelor has turned out to be the world’s biggest shopping day. As you might have realized by now, the 11/11 singles day is even bigger than Black Friday in the US. Shopping worth billions of dollars is carried out in a matter of 24 hours in China and it’s not just limited to the country as more and more sellers are looking to capitalize on the singles day promotion. As a result, a lot of our local retailers like Aliexpress, Gearbest, Banggood, etc are offering pretty interesting deals to customers on this day.

So let’s take a look at some of the deals on each site.

ALIEXPRESS

Aliexpress has one of the best deals on smartphones. Products from popular brands like Xiaomi, Yi, Li Ning etc are being offered for significant discounts. For example, the Xiaomi Mi Mix 2 6GB + 64GB model will be up for grabs for just $489 which is the cheapest price I have seen on the internet. However, only 300 units are up for grabs, so you better hurry.

Similarly, Xiaomi Mi A1 and Redmi Note 4 also get significant discounts, retailing at $194.99 and $136 respectively. Products from brands like Yi camera are discounted during the Singles day promotion.

So make sure to check out the top deals of the day from here.

GEARBEST

Despite its flaws, Gearbest is still one of the top destinations for buying Chinese smartphones and accessories. The store has a number of promotions running during the Singles Day week, including Snap up deals, category specific coupons, and daily flash sales. The store is also offering coupons for specific popular brands so that your purchase gets a few additional dollars off the regular price. There are some pretty decent deals available like the Mi Note 2 for $299 or the Leagoo KIICAA Mix for $106.

Check out more about the Gearbest 11/11 Promotion from here.

BANGGOOD

Banggood is yet another popular Chinese store that is offering interesting discounts on Singles Day. There are snap up deals and coupons up for grabs for users this week. Further, top spender also gets a CHUWI Hi10 Plus laptop. Other promotion includes buy-one-get-one-free deals on Blitzwolf accessories and even on bigger products like Allwinner cameras.

Check out more deals on Banggood during this Singles Day week from here.

GEEKBUYING

Geekbuying is also offering specific coupons per category, but you’ll have to share their posts to get hold of the codes. The site has a number of good smartphone deals like the Nubia Z17 which is currently up for sale at just $390. More deals here! They also have a dedicated Xiaomi deals page and you can check that out from here.

COOLICOOL

Just like others, Coolicool is also offering coupon codes along with cheap snap up deals. For example, you can get the Redmi 4X for just $99, which is one of the cheapest prices for the handset right now. Check out the 11/11 Coolicool deals from here!

LIGHTINTHEBOX

Lightinthebox is trying lure in buyers by offering bonus $100 loyalty reward points. Further, the site has a lot of accessories and stuff other than just tech gadgets and you can check them out from here.

TOMTOP

Tomtop is also participating in the 11/11 sale and will offer super saver deals, door crash deals, special deals for new users, 11/11 snap up sales and even specific category coupons like TTPHONE5 (only for smartphones). Do check out their deals from this link!

If you have spotted any hot deals, do let us know! We’ll be happy to add it to this article.

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China celebrates 11^th of November as Singles’ Day. It is world’s biggest online shopping day. On this day, various tech brands offer their devices with attractive discounts. Xiaomi has confirmed on the special deals that will be available on AliExpress on the upcoming 11/11 shopping day.

Xiaomi Mi MIX 2 and Mi 6

During the 11/11 sale, Xiaomi will be selling 300 units of the Mi MIX 2 flagship phone with a price tag of $489.99. It means that the phablet will be available with an attractive discount of around $123 over its usual price of $612.49. The 64 GB Xiaomi Mi 6 will be available for $369 on Nov. 11. The company will be providing only 500 units of Mi 6 at discounted price.

Xiaomi Mi A1 and Mi Max 2

Xiaomi will be the slashing the price of Mi A1 from $243.74 to $194.99. Also, it will be selling 2,000 units of the Mi A1 on Nov. 11. Xiaomi will be offering 1,140 units of Xiaomi Mi Max 2 with a price tag of $217.99. Its usual pricing is $279.47.

Xiaomi Redmi Note 5A

The Redmi Note 5A with 16 GB storage will be available with an impressive pricing of $99. Xiaomi will be providing 1,250 units of the phablet at such a low price during the upcoming sale. Its 32 GB variant will be available for $136.

Xiaomi Redmi Note 4 and Redmi 4X

The Chinese manufacturer will be offering 4,000 units of Redmi Note 4 with a discounted price tag of $136.99. Its usual pricing is $171.24. The phablet will be available in 3 GB and 4 GB RAM options. The 32 GB Redmi 4X will be available for $116. Xiaomi will be selling 1,120 units of Redmi 4X on Nov. 11.

Xiaomi Notebook Air 13.3

Xiaomi Notebook Air 13.3 will be available for $799 after a discount of $200. The company will be providing only 1,000 units for $799 on 11/11.

Xiaomi Mi Band 2

The $9 discount on Mi Band 2 will allow users to purchase it for $20.99.  The Chinese firm will be giving away 5,400 units of Mi Band 2 at discounted price.

All the aforementioned smartphones are global version devices. The company is also offering attractive price cuts on Mi Box 3 and Mijia Mini Action Camera.

What do you think about the above discounts? Will purchase any of the above listed devices? Share us your thoughts by adding your comments below.

(source)

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A few days ago, Xiaomi announced on their official Weibo account that they would release a mysterious device for a special price (99 RMB) at the Chinese online store T-Mall on Singles Day. Netizens debated over what this device could be, with many guessing that it is an enhanced version of a mobile phone battery. Some claimed that it might be a 3G MiFi. Now, the veil has been lifted. It is actually a new mobile phone battery with 16000mAh, which is about 50% higher than the previous 10400mAh battery. It also comes with two USB ports and its cover is still made of aluminum.

The official price of this battery is actually 129 RMB (21.10 USD), but will cost 99 RMB at T-Mall during China’s Singles Day. Despite having a much higher battery capacity than the 10400mAh battery, it is not as wide and can be easily carried.

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Many users are wondering about the release of the low-end version of the Xiaomi Mi4 and its price. Now, insiders reveal that it will go on sale during 11th October’s big sale. The 3G version will cost 1599 RMB (261.36 USD) while the 4G version will cost 1799(294.18 USD). The biggest difference between the original Mi4 and its low end version is that the RAM has been lowered from 3GB to 2GB. Other than that, the low-end version’s specs are almost the same.

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