China Wholesale Websites for This Order

Picking the wrong China wholesale website wastes the payment when the order never records the specification, the quantity, the payer, and the delivery endpoint.

The best website for sourcing from China is the one that can hold those four records for the goods you are buying.

Keep the choice with the other sourcing guides and fill those four fields before you compare sellers.

The best website for sourcing from China is the checkout that records your specification, accepted quantity, payer, and delivery endpoint before you pay. Alibaba Group’s pages, fetched 18 October 2026, call Alibaba.com a global B2B platform that served more than 48 million SMEs in fiscal year 2024, and call 1688.com China’s leading domestic wholesale marketplace, with over 1 million paying members as of that same fiscal year. AliExpress is described there as a global retail platform launched in 2010. Made-in-China.com’s Secured Trading buyer FAQ, fetched the same day, takes payment to the platform first and loads a USD fee chart. Global Sources returned HTTP 429, and DHgate returned a bot script, so those two descriptions stay blank.

Match the website to the four records

Start with the route that can hold the goods you are actually buying. Alibaba.com, on the group page, is the global B2B platform. 1688.com, on its group page, is the domestic wholesale marketplace. AliExpress, on its group page, is the retail platform. Made-in-China.com’s buyer FAQ is the Secured Trading checkout, and only a listing with the Trade Guarantee mark and the Start Order button is an STS product on that page.

Rule of thumb. If the card amount is above 8000 USD on a Made-in-China STS order, the USD chart fetched 18 October 2026 does not list the credit-card row for that amount. That chart prints a ceiling of US$8,000.00 for Credit/Debit Card, PayPal, Apple Pay, and Google Pay. Bank transfer on the same chart prints Unlimited.

A plain pouch listing and a later branded pouch are two offers. Record quantity by variant. A sample quantity does not set the production quantity. Put the same specification, quantity, packing, and destination on the wholesale RFQ template so each candidate answers one brief.

If none of the fetched checkouts can hold the specification and the release decision, read how a China sourcing agent works. You still approve the specification, the sample, and the release.

Takeaway: Keep a website on the shortlist only when the same four fields are filled for the same goods.

Read the Made-in-China fee chart before you pay

The buyer FAQ says Made-in-China.com provides the secured trading service free, and then says buyers are charged a transaction fee when the order payment is completed online. The fee table in the HTML is empty. The page’s script loads the USD chart from the payment API. This table is that chart, fetched 18 October 2026. It is the USD chart only.

The FAQ’s payment notes say any transfer-related charges are paid by the buyers. Free on the bank-transfer row is the platform transaction fee. It is not a statement that the bank charges nothing. The same FAQ says card review is within 1-2 hours, and that order verification usually takes 24 hours or less. The chart’s 1-2 hours is the processing line, not the whole wait.

PayPal’s exclusion list on the FAQ names Turkey, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Macau, Puerto Rico, Guam, American Samoa, and the U.S. Virgin Islands, plus other territories printed on that page. The United States is not in that printed exclusion list. Read the list on the FAQ if your payer is somewhere else.

The FAQ also says the transaction fee is not returned after a refund. A card refund of the goods amount leaves the 2.99% line charged, on that FAQ.

Worked example

Card fee = 0.0299 * transaction amount.

The rate is the Credit/Debit Card buyer fee on the USD chart. Arithmetic, on an assumed transaction amount of 100 US dollars, not a supplier price: 0.0299 * 100 = 2.99. PIX on the same chart is US$15.00 per payment and only in Brazil. Arithmetic on the same assumed 100: the PIX line is 15 and the card line is 2.99. The chart does not print the buyer’s bank charges, so this arithmetic stops at the platform fee.

STS orders on the FAQ come in three types. A negotiated order waits for a quotation, then payment. A rush order is a fixed order the buyer pays without that negotiation. A supplier-drafted order is created by the supplier, and the buyer logs in to pay. The FAQ says that if payment is not completed within a certain time, usually 7 days, the quotation is invalid and the order closes. Payment on a completed STS order is released to the supplier when you confirm receipt.

For the Alibaba.com route, the 16 October 2026 Trade Assurance capture says you agree the order on Alibaba.com, pay through Alibaba.com by an online method or a wire transfer via Alibaba.com, and the payment is held in escrow until the product is received and confirmed. The capture names delay compensation and does not print an amount. It mentions Easy Return for an eligible country and points to a country list this fetch did not open, so that list stays blank. The 18 October 2026 fetch of the same URL timed out and was not retried.

Takeaway: Use the USD chart’s fee and ceiling for the method you will actually click, and treat a refund as leaving that fee in place.

Compare delivery to one endpoint

Write the delivery endpoint into every row. A China receiving address and your overseas address are different scopes. The Made-in-China shipping policy says to communicate with the supplier about shipping and delivery details, and that the supplier can choose the method.

The same policy prints these estimates, and says delivery time depends on your region and the method the supplier chooses:

The order-confirmation line on that page says the order is confirmed within 1-3 business days, and that processing before shipment normally takes 1-60 business days because the supplier sets the dispatch date. Receipt more than 15 natural days past the time limit printed above is what that page calls late delivery, when the cause is the seller. These ranges are the FAQ’s printed ranges. They are not a transit time for your lane.

The customs line says Made-in-China.com does not pay fees or rates charged by customs, and that those charges sit between the supplier and the buyer. No duty rate is printed. The duty cell stays blank. Put a rate you have confirmed into the landed-cost formula and run the same destination through the landed-cost calculator.

Unresolved cost lines = goods amount + platform fee + freight scope + duty rate, counted only when each line is filled.

Worked example, arithmetic: a file with a goods amount, the USD chart fee, and a named freight scope, and a blank duty rate, has filled lines = 3. Required lines = 4. Unresolved lines = 4 - 3 = 1. The goods amount is your own quote. This page does not supply it.

AliExpress Choice, on the group page, is described as free shipping, free returns, and delivery guarantees from March 2023. The buyer-protection text fetched separately says a change-of-mind return shipping fee is paid by the buyer, and it prints a 15-day free-return window from receipt. Use the text that matches the service on your order. One of those pages does not erase the other.

Takeaway: Compare two websites only after both name the same receiving address and the same included freight.

Turn the list into one buying brief

A supplier name on a website is a lead. Match the business, the product, and the payment route before you treat the listing as the counterparty. The supplier verification guide is the next check, and the supplier scorecard is where the notes go.

Before comparing individual sellers, use the Made-in-China.com vs. Alibaba.com sourcing platform comparison to check which discovery filters, supplier reports, and protected-order steps apply on each platform.

The China sourcing workflow places this website choice inside specification, sample, and inspection. Choosing the website ends the route decision. It does not approve the goods.

For a quality or “not as described” claim on Made-in-China STS, the return rules say the buyer can ask the seller for a refund within 30 natural days after confirming receipt, and must provide evidence. If the goods come back, that page says the seller bears the freight. The marketing block higher on the FAQ says a refund can be applied for within 30 days after receiving the products for a delivery or product issue. Keep both clocks. They are not the same sentence. Customized products stay on the other sentence: the FAQ says it does not support refunds for them.

Takeaway: Approve the candidate whose written offer fills the brief, and leave a blank field blank.

When this does not apply

This page selects a purchasing route from the pages fetched for it. It does not approve a product, a label, or an account registration.

• Destination safety, labeling, or import evidence has to come from the rule that applies to the goods. This page does not supply that file.
• An AliExpress purchase can document the item you received. It does not set a later wholesale quantity.
• Global Sources and DHgate stay off the scored list until you have their own page for the route you will pay.
• A custom Made-in-China STS product is outside the FAQ’s refund support. Negotiate that before payment, or pick a route whose written terms cover the custom goods.
• A duty rate, a membership count for Global Sources or DHgate, and a DHgate fee stay blank. They were not on a page this fetch saved.

Takeaway: Use the four-record test on the pages that loaded, and stop where the fetch stopped.

Frequently asked questions

Is AliExpress a wholesale sourcing website?

AliExpress, on Alibaba Group’s page dated 10 July 2024, is a global retail platform launched in 2010, offered in 16 languages. Choice, from March 2023, is described there as free shipping, free returns, and delivery guarantees. The buyer-protection text fetched 18 October 2026 prints 15 days from receipt for a mismatch, damage, or shortage, and says the buyer pays return shipping on a change-of-mind return. One retail order does not set the quantity or the packing for a later wholesale lot.

What should I do when a website’s official page did not load?

Leave that website off the scored shortlist. Global Sources returned HTTP 429 on 18 October 2026, and the DHgate URLs returned a bot script. A blank cell records the failed fetch. Score Alibaba.com, 1688.com, Made-in-China STS, and AliExpress from the pages above, and add another site only after its own page is in the file.

Method and sources

Alibaba.com, 1688, and AliExpress descriptions are from their Alibaba Group business pages, fetched 18 October 2026. The businesses index on that site says “Updated as of January 2026.” The Alibaba.com page data is dated 1 December 2025, the 1688 page data 22 January 2026, and the AliExpress page data 10 July 2024. Made-in-China facts are from the Secured Trading buyer FAQ and from the USD payment chart that FAQ’s script loads, both fetched 18 October 2026. AliExpress buyer-protection sentences are from the final URL after the protection address redirected, fetched the same day.

The Trade Assurance URL timed out on 18 October 2026 and was not retried. The order, payment, escrow, and resolution steps are from a capture saved 16 October 2026. That capture’s footer reads 1999-2024. Library searches for these marketplaces returned no documents. A cached SERP search for this keyword returned no saved result, and no new SERP was purchased.

The 2.99% card line, the Free bank-transfer line, the US$15 PIX and SPEI lines, the ceilings, and the 3-10, 3-14, and 3-60 business day ranges are printed on those saved pages. The 100 dollar card line and the unresolved-cost count are arithmetic on assumed or counted inputs, labeled above.

Takeaway: Use the fetched pages for the route you will pay, and leave every missing fee, duty, and transit cell blank.