Shop Taobao In English: Your Step-By-Step Guide

Looking to shop Taobao in English, in Hong Kong? With so much available, the site can be a bit of a maze, so we’ve put together a handy guide to help you shop stress-free.

Taobao is a paradise for savvy shoppers: full of amazing deals and reputable sellers. The online shopping platform is a treasure trove, stocking absolutely everything you could ever be looking for. For those of us who can’t read simplified Chinese, and are bound to be intimidated by the sheer volume of things available to purchase (we’re talking homeware, wall art, jewellery, clothing accessories and so much more) — here’s how to shop Taobao in English (made even simpler when you use Baopals!), with our step-by-step guide. We’re still keeping in mind the costs of fast fashion and textile waste, so shop with intention!

Read More: Online Shopping In Hong Kong – Top Fashion Websites With Free Shipping

Jump To:
Getting Started On Taobao
Shopping Taobao: Step By Step
Checking On Your Taobao Order
Shop Taobao In English On Baopals

Getting Started On Taobao

Before you start, you’ll want to use a web translator. We recommend going with Google Chrome as your browser and making use of its built-in translator. You can also use the built-in translator in Safari.

You’ll see an icon in your toolbar that allows you to translate the whole webpage from Chinese Simplified into English. Note: Taobao’s site and app may appear in traditional Chinese in Hong Kong but its sellers and shops use simplified Chinese.

Can’t see it? Make sure it’s on by going to your Settings, hitting Languages and checking if you’ve allowed Google Chrome to “Use Google Translate”.

Sassy Tip: Still too complicated? Try Baopals, an online shopping bridge to Taobao that translates the entire platform into English! Click here to learn more.

To start, go to world.taobao.com — the worldwide version of Taobao. You might be redirected automatically to the Hong Kong version of the site. If not, you can always click the dropdown menu and choose Hong Kong.

As you can tell, the search bar is right at the top with an orange translated “search” button (hidden in this screenshot!). On the left are your categories, translated here as “classification”.

Registering

The first thing to do now is to create an account, which is free and incredibly easy as you can register in English. Click on “Register” (免費注冊 or 免費註冊), translated for us as “free registration”, on the left of the menu bar at the top, then follow on-screen instructions to create your Taobao account. We chose the English button on the top right!

1. Type in your Hong Kong mobile number, with no spaces.
2. Hit “get verification code”.
3. Enter the verification code you get as a text message. You’re in!

You might want to stop here and enter more details into your account information — like your preferred delivery address — before you shop.

Shopping Taobao: Step By Step

You could easily spend an entire day clicking through Taobao. To begin your foray into this whole new world, start by typing what you want to look for in the search bar. Typing in English keywords will give you a decent number of results, but it’s best to search in Chinese — Google Translate will be your best friend!

Jump To:
Step 1: Searching And Browsing
Step 2: Choosing Your Item
Step 3: Product Information, Reviews And Ratings
Step 4: Buying Your Item
Step 5: Placing Your Order
Step 6: Filling In Delivery Details
Step 7: Confirmation

Sassy Tip: Finding it near-impossible to browse Taobao directly? Shop the entire site — including Taobao, Tmall and JD Jingdong — in English when you use Baopals, a bridge between you and the sellers and products, with information (and translations!) always updated in real-time!

Step 1: Searching And Browsing On Taobao

Begin by typing in the item you want to buy in the search bar, preferably in Chinese. You will be presented with a range of filters including brand, material, style and more. Choose a few and then sort them by using the sorting tools:

• Comprehensive sorting: Sorts search results according to an average of the following parameters.
• Sales volume: Sorts search results according to the number of sales.
• Reputation: Sorts search results according to the reputation of sellers from customer reviews and ratings.
• Price: Sorts search results according to price, from high to low or from low to high.
• Price range: Type in your ideal price range (in RMB, as shown by the￥) for the item you are searching for.

You can also tick off additional filters like “free shipping” or “secondhand”.

Type in multiple keywords in the search bar to narrow down your results instead of using the filters as sellers usually include keywords in product names. For example, instead of “skirt” (短裙), try typing in “high-waisted denim skirt” (高腰牛仔短裙).

Here are a few quick links to our favourite categories:

Womenswear
Women’s Shoes
Cosmetics
Homeware
Furniture
Summer Essentials
Sports Gear
Cameras

You can also visit this website for a more comprehensive list of Taobao shopping categories.

• To find better quality products (mainly clothing), type in “外貿” (which means products to be exported) at the end of your search.
• To find more recently released products, type in the current year e.g. “女装外貿 2022” (womenswear for export 2022) for new womenswear of export quality.
• Stay away from products that are too cheap. They’re usually of very inferior quality and will be a waste of your money, whilst defeating the purpose of trying to shop sustainably.
• Taobao clothing sizes are usually smaller than normal sizes. Buy a size or two bigger than your normal size to play it safe.

Step 2: Choosing Your Item On Taobao

A great way to determine if an item is of good quality is to see the number of recent transactions, which are shown by the grey numbers next to the prices. The name of the store/seller is shown after the three orange stripes in grey. An icon to take note of is the small red square on the very bottom of the item, which indicates that the item is from a Tmall store. The small white words highlighted in orange mean “free shipping” but this is usually only applicable to delivery within China.

We picked the fourth crystal lamp shown, which was recently purchased by over 5,000 people, is a Tmall item, and is from a store in Guangdong.

Items which don’t have this little red square are from Taobao sellers. If you’re confused, here’s the difference between Taobao and Tmall:

• Taobao: Taobao is a C2C (consumer-to-consumer) online store and acts as a platform for individuals to sell goods to consumers. Anyone can set up an online store on Taobao as long as they meet certain requirements.
• Tmall: Tmall is like Amazon. It runs on a B2C (business-to-consumer) model, which means that the seller has to be either a registered brand, an official manufacturer, or an organization selling their goods to customers. If you’re worried about counterfeits or low-quality goods like tube dresses that are more akin to onesies, Tmall is your safe bet as Taobao requires all Tmall sellers to prove that they are a legitimate company/store/manufacturer. There are also certificates of quality and compliance on each seller’s page.

Step 3: Product Information, Reviews And Ratings

The first thing we usually do is check out the product information and the reviews. Scroll down to see more information and photos from the seller, then click on the second tab, which translated as “evaluation” for us, to read reviews. Click on “Pictures” to see reviews with photos of the item to get an idea of what it actually looks like.

The box on the top will display a rating that tells you how close the product is to the seller’s description. Next to the number are boxed words with numbers in brackets — these refer to the most frequent reviews of the product.

For instance, 22 buyers said that the product was “very useful”, and 18 buyers said that it “charges quickly”. These give a good indication of the overall quality of the product as they naturally help filter out inconsistent reviews.

Sassy Tip: “The baby” is a direct translation of the phrase [這個寶貝], which is a phrase used by buyers that means “this product”.

Each Tmall and Taobao seller is given ratings by their past customers, and both are given rankings out of five for:

Description: How closely the actual item resembles the product description.
Service: The quality of customer service provided by the seller.
Delivery: The speed and efficiency of delivery.

A rating of 4.8 or higher is considered a good rating.

Sassy Tip: You can click on the name of the Taobao seller — the bolded black words above the special ratings — to go into their shop and see other items available for purchase.

Step 4: Buying Your Item On Taobao

To buy your item, choose the one you want amongst the photos — we chose the second version which is multicoloured — then decide on the quantity. If you want to continue shopping, click “add to shopping cart” or choose “buy now” if you’d like to go straight to checkout.

Step 5: Placing Your Order

To checkout, select the item you want to buy now by ticking the box on the left of the item, then select “checkout”.

Step 6: Filling In Delivery Details

Unfortunately, this is usually a pop-up and may not be translated automatically but our translations are here to help! There is no zip code for Hong Kong, so simply fill in six zeros.

Your shipping options are usually Direct Shipping and Consolidated Shipping (aka Taobao Cargo). Direct Shipping can be expensive (usually more than what the website shows) and rarely worth the price, so we’d suggest you pick Consolidated Shipping, which is cheaper and works like this:

All your item(s) will be sent to the same warehouse, even if they’re from different sellers. When all the items you’ve bought have arrived at the warehouse, you can deliver them to your own home or office all in one go, which is when you will be asked to make the second payment.

Here are some of our favourite warehouses:

• Giants HK, www.giantsco.com
• Point2point, www.point2point.hk
• HK Refill, www.hkrefill.com

You’ll write the warehouse’s address into the “Address” [详细地址] section!

Sassy Tip: Many couriers charge an extra $20-$30 for delivery to Hong Kong residential addresses (which is not included in the prices shown on the website), so deliver to your office or choose self-pickup at Hong Kong post offices, 7-11s or collection points to save that extra bit of cash.

After confirming your order, you will be prompted to select your payment method.

Step 7: Confirmation

After you’ve made your payment, you will get a confirmation that your purchase is successful.

Sassy Tip: It’s easy to add to cart on Taobao — but shipping to Hong Kong is a whole different story! Baopals brings your parcel directly to your door, with minimal international fees. Click here to learn more.

Checking On Your Taobao Order

Unfortunately, you won’t be receiving any emails or text messages that your item has reached the warehouse so you’ll have to either check back in 1 to 3 days. You can also download the “Taobao Global App” in the App Store or Google Play, which can send you notifications. To check whether your item has reached the warehouse, head to “My Account” [我的淘寶], then click on “Purchased Items” [已买到的宝贝]

Taobao Refunds

We certainly hope this isn’t necessary because it can be a little of a chore but in case you really aren’t satisfied with your item, you can request a refund from the seller within 25 days. However, we strongly advise against this as it can get messy to return items from Hong Kong — so make sure you are purchasing a product you want to keep! Check out this guide for more details.

Now head to Taobao and start shopping!

Shop Taobao In English On Baopals

Online shopping platform Baopals bridges the gap between Chinese-speaking sellers on Taobao, Tmall and JD (Jingdong) and English-speaking shoppers. It was started by three Shanghai-based expatriate friends who wanted a more convenient way to shop online in the Mainland.

So for those of us who struggle to read and understand Chinese, you can now shop China’s largest marketplaces directly in English, with access to over a billion products as well as information that is updated and translated from Chinese to English in real-time.

Plus, a dedicated bilingual team is available to communicate directly with sellers and logistics teams to handle specific inquiries or any issues. A language barrier is no longer an obstacle to getting those ceramic bowls you’ve been eyeing — it’s never been so easy to browse and shop on Taobao.

Editor’s Note: “Your Step-by-Step Guide to Shopping on Taobao” was most recently updated in March 2023 by Sakina Abidi. With thanks to Rachel Au for her contribution.