A Step-by-Step Guide on How to Buy from AliExpress

Introduction

AliExpress is an online retail website launched in 2010 that allows international buyers to purchase a variety of items from wholesale sellers in China and have the items delivered to through various international courier services depending on the country. AliExpress ships goods to over 200 countries and region worldwide including high populated countries like India and Russia. According to the recent numbers, it is the most visited e-commerce site in Russia.

AliExpress has become a household name in my many countries. Anyone that loves e-commerce, will also find AliExpress to be a great platform to purchase products for a reasonable price.

How it works?

First, you need to sing up to be able to access the platform take advantage of the low prices. Personal information such as name, contact number, address, zip code number and other necessary details are required to sing up. After providing the listed details, you are ready to go and enjoy the cheapest shopping experience.

Tip for ordering on Ali

Thousands of sellers listed their products on the platform. During the process of making your order, care must be taken to select the best quality products as there are different standards of goods from various sellers. Here are some tips that help you find the product you are looking for.

Search

Search from the categories of items listed by different sellers. The platform offers a wide range of goods, such as phones, accessories, clothing, home electronics, children toys, sporting equipment and much more. Select the category and scroll down to your selection and click on it.

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Purchase

 On the product page, please make sure you read the item description and also take a closer look at the images below the description. Once you are happy with what you see, you can proceed with the purchase and click the “Buy Now” button.

Order confirmation

On the order confirmation page, please make sure your shipping address is correct and the method of shipment is also selected.

TIP: We recommend to select ePackages as the shipping method, in most cases this cost $1-2 more and the package arrives in 7-10 business days.

Payment methods

There are different payment methods on AliExpress site. Please note that PayPal is currently not supported on AliExpress. But you can open a AliPay account wich is similar to PayPal and offers additional buyer protection. The total cost is based on the price of the item and shipping fee. In some cases, stores do offer additional coupons that will be subtracted on the overview page (a post about the different types of coupons is coming soon).

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Shipment and order tracking

Once the order is placed, the seller has several days to fulfill the order. If the order is not fulfilled, you get a full refund. In most cases it takes 1-5 days until the seller updates the tracking number.

Order completion

Once the order is complete (item arrived), you have the choice to mark the order as completed. Which signals AliExpress that the order was successful.

Buyers’ protection

 In some cases, things don’t work out as expected. Please note that most items that are listed on AliExpress have a “Buyer Protection”. This means you can get a full refund in cases where you are not happy with the product in case of a damaged delivery or miss delivery.  

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TIP: In our Symbols Guide article, we elaborated on Buyers protection and the exact process on Aliexpress. Make sure to check out the article here.

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Why AliExpress?

There are many e-commerce site out there, yet AliExpress provides the largest variety of products with prices that are quite hard to match. The increase security and buyer protection policy provides more security for customers across the globe. If you have not signed up yet, I would say its about time.