Buying on 1688 without speaking Chinese

You can find and compare products on 1688 yourself, with your browser’s translation. Ordering from abroad is harder: sellers chat in Chinese, and many deliver and take payment only inside China. So the usual path is a person in China who talks to the seller, receives and checks the goods, and ships them on. Pay for the goods and the help separately.

Open any listing and the first two points are plain within a few minutes: the listings, the store pages and the seller chat are in Chinese, and delivery and payment terms are set by each seller. This page follows one order from the first search to the parcel leaving China.

One order, step by step

1. You: search and shortlist. Search in English through your browser’s translation. If the translated titles make no sense, search by image instead. Shortlist three listings for the same item. Keep: the listing links and screenshots with the date.
2. You, then your person in China: check the seller. Read the seller’s store page: years on 1688, badges, the business license it shows and its returns terms. Chinese law requires a business that sells online to show its license information, or a link to it, prominently on its home page, so if a store shows none, ask why. Your person reads the parts the translation turns into nonsense. Keep: a screenshot of the store page.
3. Your person in China: ask the seller. In the seller’s chat, confirm the price at each quantity tier, the minimum order, the lead time, a sample and the packing. Keep: the chat transcript, exported.
4. The account holder: order and pay for the goods. Place the order and pay through the checkout 1688 offers that account. Which payment methods appear depends on the account, so look at the checkout before you plan the money. See who holds the account below. Keep: the order number and the payment record.
5. The seller, then your person: receive in China. The goods go to your person’s address, or to a warehouse address in China you choose. Your person photographs the cartons before opening them, so any damage in transit is on record before anyone touches the goods. Keep: delivery photos and the courier slip.
6. Your person in China: check the goods. Count the units, open a few, photograph them and compare them with the listing. For a larger lot, sample by the national standard; the AQL sample size calculator gives the number to pull. If you would rather pay an inspector for the count, see what a pre-shipment inspection costs in China. Keep: a dated photo report.
7. Your person, with your carrier: repack and ship out. Consolidate, label and hand to an international carrier or a forwarder you choose. You pick and pay the carrier; your person only hands the parcel over and sends you the paperwork. Keep: the packing list and the tracking number.
8. The account holder: close the order. Confirm receipt on 1688 only after the check. If the goods don’t match, open an after-sales request instead, with the dated photo report from step 6 as the evidence. Keep: the confirmation, or the dispute record.

Steps 2 and 6 are the same work a sourcing freelancer does for a factory order, on a smaller scale. How to hire a freelance sourcing agent in China covers the larger version, and checking a factory without flying there covers a visit when the seller is the factory. For step 3, a Chinese-speaking assistant in China can run the seller chat as part of a wider job.

What 1688’s own pages say

This section uses only 1688’s own pages, read on October 18, 2026. It is the reference part of the page; if you only want the steps, skip ahead to who holds the account.

The Terms of Use for users outside mainland China (version 2025V2, effective August 26, 2025) answer the first question: yes, you can register from abroad. 1688 counts you as a user outside mainland China if you are verified with an overseas identity, registered with an overseas mobile number, or located overseas and registered by email or a third-party account. Such a user contracts with 1688.COM PTE. LTD., in Singapore. One user may register one account, and no member may share their account, ID or password with another person, “even to other individuals within the Member’s own business entity.”

The same terms describe 1688 as “exclusively an intermediary service provider.” It does not control the quality of what sellers offer. Buyers and sellers set their own terms on payment, returns, warranties and shipping. Buyers of cross-border products may owe import duty and other taxes, and unless the terms say otherwise, import taxes are the buyer’s to pay. Budget for duty in the US, the UK or wherever the goods land, on top of the goods and the freight. A dispute with 1688 itself, as opposed to one with a seller, goes to arbitration in Hong Kong under Hong Kong law, and claims about 1688’s service must be filed within one year unless the governing law allows longer.

The buyer protection page (买家保障) lists extra services that sellers in some industries choose to offer on top of 1688’s basic buyer protection, each shown as a mark on the listing. One mark promises a free exchange within 7, 15, 21 or 60 days of signing for the goods. Another pays compensation, as a share of the amount paid, when the seller misses the shipping time it promised. A material guarantee covers goods that don’t match the material agreed with the buyer, and “假一赔一” (one fake, one paid back) covers goods that aren’t genuine, up to 5,000 yuan.

These apply only where the listing carries the mark, so check for it before you order and keep it in your dated screenshot. The service agreements behind these marks, in 1688’s help center, say the seller is responsible for each service, and that 1688 is not. They also define the lead time a seller promises, and the definition has a catch:

Put simply, a lead time agreed in chat counts for this guarantee only if it names the order number and is agreed between the order’s own buyer and seller. It comes back in the next section.

1688 also runs a cross-border section, 跨境专供 (cross-border supply), at global.1688.com, with search by image. The buyer protection page and the help agreements carry no date.

Who holds the account

Whoever holds the account places the order, pays and owns any dispute. There are two ways to set it up.

Holding your own account suits a buyer who expects to order again: the order history and the dispute rights stay with you, and so do the seller contacts. Letting your person order can be simpler for a single test order, as long as you accept that the order is in their name.

If you hold the account, remember that 1688’s terms don’t let you hand your login to your person in China. They talk to the seller in their own words, and the seller confirms the terms to you, in your order’s chat.

If your person holds the account, the order is legally theirs. The terms make each member responsible for everything done under their account, purchases included. Agree in writing, before the first order, that the goods belong to you from the moment you pay for them.

Paying for goods and for help, separately

Two kinds of money move in one order: the fee for the help and the price of the goods.

The fee is a payment for a service, and money-transfer providers treat it that way.

For a business paying an individual, Wise’s guide to CNY transfers lists only UnionPay and Alipay. Sending goods money on such a route as “Services” misstates what the money is for.

Goods money is different, and dressing it up as something else runs into China’s foreign exchange rules for individuals, which forbid both splitting payments and false paperwork.

Keep the two apart, then. The goods are paid at 1688’s checkout by the account holder. The freelancer’s fee is paid as a service fee, by its own route, and How to pay a freelancer in China from abroad goes through the routes and their limits. If your person holds the account, settle at the start how the goods money can reach them under a purpose that matches it. Routes that accept only “Salary” or “Services” don’t fit goods money.

What the person in China is paid for

This is the part to paste into your brief. Write the job as a short scope, so the bids price the same work. Define a task in units anyone can count, for example one order of up to a set number of cartons, or one seller chat up to a set number of questions, and ask for a price per unit. The scope itself:

• questions to the seller, in the seller’s chat;
• ordering and handling samples;
• receiving the goods at their address or a warehouse;
• the check in step 6, with a dated photo report;
• repacking, labeling and handing the parcel to your carrier.

Pay a fixed fee per order or per task, never a percentage of the goods. A cut of the goods rewards a bigger order, not a better one. Sourcing agent fees: commission or fixed fee sets the two side by side, and what freelancers cost in China shows what the work costs by role. The services agreement checklist covers the contract, including who owns what, and how to vet a freelancer in China covers choosing the person.

Freelancers who do this work bid on jobs in the sourcing and quality control, e-commerce and logistics categories. For the wider picture, start with How to hire a freelancer in China without speaking Chinese.

Before you pay a seller

• A dated screenshot of the store page and the listing, with any protection mark
• The price for your quantity tier, confirmed in the seller’s chat
• A sample first, for a product you haven’t bought before
• The returns terms, read and saved
• The lead time in writing, tied to the order number

Post the order as a brief: the listing, the quantity and the checks you want. Start a brief.