AliExpress and Alibaba: Unpacking their Battle for E-Commerce Supremacy in 2025 – Shopify Reviews

Unless you’ve established your own product manufacturing operations, you probably need reliable third-party suppliers. One of the best ways to find suppliers is through online marketplaces—platforms designed to help buyers like retailers and ecommerce merchants connect with manufacturers, wholesalers, and distributors.

Two of the most popular marketplaces for sourcing products online are Alibaba and AliExpress, both owned by the Alibaba Group—sometimes items may even appear on both platforms. Whether you need to source bulk inventory or find dropshipping suppliers, read on to learn how AliExpress and Alibaba work, how they compare, and how each online marketplace can potentially benefit your ecommerce business.

What is AliExpress?

AliExpress is a business-to-consumer (B2C) ecommerce retail platform owned by the Alibaba Group that features millions of products from thousands of different suppliers, primarily based in China. Popular categories on AliExpress include beauty products, toys, shoes, pet supplies, and consumer electronics.

If you’re an ecommerce business, you can become a seller on AliExpress, or source products from thousands of large-scale manufacturers on the platform. You can also use AliExpress to find suppliers for your dropshipping business, using AliExpress’s dropshipping portal to find, research, and buy products. When customers purchase products in your store, those orders go directly to the suppliers, who then fulfill orders by picking, packing, and shipping the items.

Because these orders often involve international shipments, delivery times for AliExpress can range from one to 50 days, depending on the shipping method and destination. Buyers don’t need to pay to use the platform; sellers pay a commission of between 5% and 8%, depending on the product category.

What is Alibaba?

Alibaba is a business-to-business (B2B) wholesale marketplace that connects companies that manufacture goods with companies that need inventory. Alibaba is run by the Alibaba Group, a public company that owns other marketplaces as well, including AliExpress, Tmall (business-to-consumer), and Taobao (consumer-to-consumer).

Alibaba features many of the same product categories as AliExpress (like consumer electronics and beauty products), but it also includes raw materials like metals, plastics, and textiles sourced from suppliers primarily based in China.

Outside of the bulk inventory side of the marketplace, Alibaba offers a dedicated dropshipping portal that features products from suppliers who provide order fulfillment services for merchants. You can research suppliers and import products to your online store through the dropshipping portal. When a customer places an order, Alibaba automatically sends that information to the supplier to fulfill the order.

Shipping can typically take anywhere from five to 40 days, depending on the destination and shipping method. The Alibaba marketplace is free for buyers, and suppliers can use the platform starting at $166 per month with no commissions imposed on sales.

AliExpress vs. Alibaba: How do they compare?

• Type of marketplace
• Minimum order quantity
• Price negotiation
• Buyer protection
• Shipping

Both Alibaba and AliExpress can act as platforms for sourcing products for an ecommerce merchant’s online business, but they serve different functions and have unique features.

Type of marketplace

Whereas Alibaba focuses on bulk orders of wholesale inventory, AliExpress is geared more to consumers with the option for small purchases of even one item like a necklace, wallet, or phone case. Conversely, Alibaba has a more robust B2B offering, as it can also supply raw materials and industrial machinery to retailers and merchants who want to produce their own products.

For example, a clothing company could purchase raw materials like textiles as well as industrial machinery like sewing machines on Alibaba. By contrast, an ecommerce merchant could use AliExpress to incorporate low-cost apparel into its store via dropshipping.

Minimum order quantity

Many of Alibaba’s offerings include a minimum order quantity (MOQ), a requirement for the smallest order amount that a buyer can make of a particular wholesale item. For example, a supplier selling t-shirts could set an MOQ of 200, meaning retailers would need to place an order for at least that many t-shirts to do business with that supplier. AliExpress, on the other hand, has no minimum order quantity requirements.

Price negotiation

Some bulk inventory suppliers on Alibaba set a fixed wholesale price, whereas others allow negotiation. Alibaba lets buyers on the platform contact suppliers directly to negotiate a price and complete a payment.

On the other hand, AliExpress prices are fixed, aside from promotions or discount codes.

Buyer protection

Alibaba offers Trade Assurance, an order protection program that includes payments being withheld from suppliers until confirmed delivery, an on-time delivery guarantee, and a money-back policy where customers can claim a refund for missed deliveries, incorrect orders, or damaged items. AliExpress does not offer Trade Assurance, although it does have some buyer protection that lets customers submit an application for a refund within 15 days of delivery.

Shipping

Because Alibaba typically involves suppliers transporting bulk inventory to a warehouse, shipments usually require sea or air freight, which can take several days to weeks to arrive. AliExpress offers a variety of shipping options, including standard shipping with average delivery times of 15 to 45 days and premium shipping with deliveries completed in a few days to a week. AliExpress works with a variety of shipping companies (like FedEx and DHL) to deliver products directly to customers.

Why use AliExpress?

AliExpress is a popular marketplace that dropshippers use to source products for their businesses. Here are a few of the reasons so many use AliExpress:

• Ease of use. AliExpress is designed to quickly integrate with ecommerce stores and automatically process orders placed through your online store.

• International sales. AliExpress is available in 18 languages and 220 countries and regions around the world, making it a dropshipping option for expanding into international markets.

• Built-in audience. Since AliExpress is a business-to-customer marketplace, the platform has existing web traffic, meaning AliExpress can act as both a supplier and a sales channel for your dropshipping company.

• Pricing and promotion tools. AliExpress lets sellers set prices, offer discount codes, and run flash sales.

Why use Alibaba?

Alibaba is a platform that best serves merchants that need to source inventory for their retail or online stores, rather than dropshipping merchants. Here are a few of the main benefits for merchants choosing this platform:

• Competitive pricing. Alibaba offers bulk discounts for a wholesale business, direct manufacturer, or merchant needing to stock inventory, as well as competitive prices for some dropshipping products.

• Wide selection of suppliers. Alibaba works with more than 2.8 million suppliers in about 5,900 product categories.

• Protection. Alibaba’s Trade Assurance program applies to eligible products, and can provide buyers with the certainty that their orders will arrive on time and in good condition, or else they can claim a refund.

• Available for small businesses. Alibaba includes suppliers offering fairly low minimum order quantities for items (sometimes around 50 or 100) compared to other wholesale marketplaces, allowing small businesses to purchase more limited orders of wholesale inventory and then scale up orders as needed.