Why it matters: The 2025 618 shopping festival saw China’s major e-commerce platforms revamping their promotional strategies to simplify discounts, strengthen price guarantees, and introduce innovative marketing tactics. These changes aim to enhance consumer experience and boost merchant confidence in one of the country’s largest annual sales events.
Details:
Tmall: Tmall has ditched its traditionally complex full-reduction deals in favor of a straightforward “official instant discount” offering 15% off on a single item, effectively an 85% price point. This discount can be combined with 88VIP coupons, category-specific vouchers (e.g., beauty, apparel), and live-streaming red envelopes. To prevent price manipulation, Tmall introduced a lowest-price verification mechanism and extended price protection until July 5. Merchant support includes new refund timeout alerts and an “abnormal refund complaint” channel to enhance handling of unusual orders during the event.
JD.com: JD.com’s 618 campaign is split into a preheat phase from May 13 to 28 (“Heartfelt Shopping Season”) and the official event starting May 31. A key feature is the “Trial Festival,” encouraging consumers to try products before buying through free giveaways, one-yuan trials, and 6.18 yuan (~$0.90) bundles, helping brands build trial user bases. JD also offers incentives for instant retail merchants, rewarding ad spend milestones with rebates.
Douyin: The platform is distributing 100 billion yuan (~$14.5 billion) in consumer coupons, with maximum individual subsidies up to 2,280 yuan (~$330). Shopping spans short videos, live streams, mall, and search, featuring group buys, brand discounts, and outlet deals. The promotion coincides with holidays like Dragon Boat Festival and Children’s Day, offering specialized campaigns including heritage craft showcases. Douyin is also enhancing merchant support by waiving commission fees on product cards and boosting advertising incentives.
PDD: PDD’s 618 event runs from May 13 to June 20, starting a week earlier than last year. The platform has eased its “lowest price on the internet” mandate for invited brands, adopting a “same product, same price” policy within stores to lower merchant barriers. All products labeled for 618 must provide “price difference compensation” guarantees to protect consumers. Importantly, sales prices during the event will not count toward historical lowest-price calculations, giving merchants pricing flexibility post-promotion. Pinduoduo also channels subsidies and coupons to boost order volumes.Context: These strategic shifts reflect China’s e-commerce giants’ efforts to simplify consumer incentives, reinforce trust through price guarantees, and innovate marketing approaches amid intensifying competition. By extending price protection and introducing trial programs, platforms aim to deepen consumer engagement and secure merchant participation in a lengthened 618 season that now spans more than a month.
