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Peiyue Wu · · 7 min readLoopholes, logistics, luck: Taobao and DHgate’s US moment
As Shein and Temu feel the heat from rising US-China trade tensions, two lesser-known Chinese ecommerce players are quietly breaking through in the world’s biggest consumer market.
By April 18, viral TikTok videos from Chinese sellers had pushed Taobao and DHgate to respectively become the no. 2 and no. 4 free iOS apps in the US.
The timing is no accident. On April 2, the US announced a 10% baseline tariff on trading partners, with Chinese imports hit by a 54% tariff – later spiking to 145%.
The app rankings have since shifted, but these clips – filmed months ago – may have left a lasting impact on Western consumers.
Image credit: Timmy Loen
The videos paint Taobao – a unit of Alibaba – as a treasure trove of quality goods favored by Chinese consumers. More controversially, they also reveal that many high-end European brands manufacture extensively in China.
Some clips linked directly to DHgate, where knockoff Louis Vuitton bags sell for as little as US$30 – a steep drop from the original items’ US$2,000-plus retail prices.
These viral videos aren’t telling stories that are particularly new: China has been the world’s factory for decades. But they’ve given a human face to the tariff-related headlines, independent ecommerce analyst Juozas Kaziukėnas tells Tech in Asia.
“Now, people are ready to listen,” he adds.
Alibaba declined to comment for this story, and DHgate didn’t reply to requests for comments.
Making China cool again
TikTok has often been seen as a geopolitical pawn in US-China relations. But it has also become an “unexpected bridge for China’s soft power,” Du Jiayi, a research fellow at the Sino-German International Event Management Shanghai Research Center, tells Tech in Asia.
When TikTok faced a potential US ban earlier this year, millions of Western users went on Xiaohongshu, the social commerce app known outside China as RedNote. There, they stumbled onto many Chinese products, from indie beauty brand Chando’s cosmetics to auto manufacturer BYD’s electric cars.
See also: Xiaohongshu shows Americans a whole new social media world
“For years, the narrative pushed by some Western policymakers painted China’s manufacturing dominance as a threat,” Du says. “But now, through the lens of TikTok, young Western consumers are discovering a different story: that China isn’t just the world’s factory, it’s the source of style, affordability, and access.”
No one is spared
Workarounds in motion
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Once niche, these Chinese platforms are going viral on TikTok – offering US shoppers low prices and offbeat goods that Western sites lack.
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