AliExpress..what's the catch?

Don't think so. It's a perfect place to buy small tchotchkes from but never EVER get any fragile or expensive stuff from them because it often arrives shattered into pieces. And always check the feedback of the seller you're buying things from because there are some very unreliable ones.

Also check WISH, they are basically from the same source/sellers/whoesalers, all shipped from China. I used to buy my phone cases, wallets, small gadgets...from Amazon, not any more. Now I buy from WISH or AliExpress and pay a fraction of the price on Amazon. The difference is on Amazon you get them faster within a week, and the products may come with a different brand name or packed in a box with labels etc, but they are the same mass manufactured goods, you can stamp any brand name you want, really not much difference. It might take a couple weeks for WISH and AliExpress to arrive but they all arrived in good conditions, I never had any issues.

[quote]It has alot of stuff

Oh, dear.

The catch is that you're getting something from fly by night companies in deepest darkest Shen-zhen of unknown material origin.

I buy stuff from there. But no electronics or anything expensive.

These sites are very difficult to navigate. I suspect it's done on purpose to confuse customers. Same with Light in the box. Or maybe the Asians prefer it this way?

Your items smell like fish and diesel when they arrive.

The stuff is often copyright theft, not that that seems to bother most people.

Buying it supports the people who brought you covid 19 and then covered it up so it could spread, not that that seems to bother most people.

They are also a repressive, totalitarian society bent on world domination, not that that seems to bother most people.

So enjoy you tchotchkes.

[quote] They are also a repressive, totalitarian society bent on world domination, not that that seems to bother most people.

Sounds a lot like the US.

No it doesn't, R9: there's no great wall of the internet in the US, no social credit scores, the Chinese have a huge military (which kind of sucks for them, btw: too many people but not enough good weapons); and the Chinese practice genocide daily.

But you knew that and posted shit anyway.

Ali Express was created by a Chinese corporation to cater to Latin America and Eastern Europe. Today their biggest buyers are Brazilians and Russians, because of the cheap prizes. The whole idea was to sell to them stuff at a lower price just like you can find in the US. Many posters here aren't aware of how expensive gadgets can be in Latin America due to abusive taxation of imports. By way of example. Foxconn opened a factory in Brazil to ensemble Ipads and Iphones and Apple didn't lower their prizes at all, that's the reality people outside the US have to deal with.

I had to do a clipping of this company last month, so that's what I remember. As for being reliable, why would you use AliEpress when things in the US are already so cheap? Ali is legit, and in many countries they have shady deals with the customs so that you can get your stuff without taxation. BH Photo out of New York City used to have a deal with the Brazilian customs and even offered a "special Brazilian" which for over 15 years was the only way for the Brazilian film industry to import stuff at a reasonable price, everything in many foreign countries is extremely expensive, Americans with no family abroad or in developing nations have no clue how hard most of the world get when it comes to shopping

The only thing America truly stands out as unique is the cheap prices and reliable sales.

If the US was ruled anything like China, r9 would soon be arrested.

They have great deals on food products from Wuhan.

[quote]But are there any other catches?

A lot of it is fake. While you are getting some things straight from the suppliers rather than marked up through retailers, many things are also shoddily made copies. Stay away from anything that looks too good to be true. Wish is even worse because they even post images stolen from the designs they are copying.

Shipping takes a month or more typically. That’s the catch.

The Youtube channel Linus Tech Tips did a whole video segment a couple years ago where he tried to build a PC using only parts bought from Wish.com. Most of the items he was sent were counterfeit. I've bought from Alibaba many years ago, and the items sent to me were clearly fake knock offs.

Sometimes it takes months for your cheap shit to arrive in the mail.

I've been waiting 2+ months for the fake cocks for my GI Joes.

A lot of it is cheap not only in price but also in quality. A lot of the stuff costs them only 0.10$ to make and they sell it for a 1.00$ to overseas buyers. Shippingand export is subsidized by the Chinese government so shipping costs are next to nothing.

It seems like heaven for drag queens--lots of fake eyelashes and wigs

[quote] Buying it supports the people who brought you covid 19 and then covered it up so it could spread, not that that seems to bother most people.

I didn't realize Trump was involved

People know they are getting poorly made knock-offs from Aliexpress, and they don't care. Women who buy fake MK and LV handbags on there carry them for a season then chuck em. It's better than paying retail for every trend. I still get all my phone cases that way and they do the job.

I ordered a guitar pedal from there that was supposed to be a knockoff of a wildly expensive pedal and had good reviews. Bought it knowing it was a knockoff.

They sent me a knockoff of the knockoff I tried to buy, didn't even have the right input soldered on.

Just bought a MacBook Pro there for my nephew. It was a good deal but will take months to arrive.