A couple of weeks ago I used AliExpress for the first time, for two orders back to back. I never had a reason to buy anything from AliExpress before but it just strangely happened that I needed to buy two different things from them.
I wanted to buy a CD player called the SMSL PL100. They were out of stock on Amazon but found it available on AliExpress with free shipping to Kuwait. Basically was going to be the same price as Amazon or maybe slightly cheaper. I placed the order on August 3rd.
The next thing I wanted to get was the new ANBERNIC RG 477M game console. It was available on the Abnernic website but they were charging $50 to ship to Kuwait. It was the same price on AliExpress with free shipping to Kuwait. So I placed the order on August 6.
I wanted the Anbernic for my LA flight which is later today and wasn’t sure if I’d get it in time. To my surprise both items were delivered to my door on August 13th. I thought they would arrive to the post office but similar to TEMU, my items got delivered to my home.
Overall it wasn’t a bad experience. I only had difficulty at first creating an account, both accounts I created were locked up instantly because it thought I was a bot or spam or something. Nearly put me off but then got it working. There are always offers as well it seems, and I used a coupon to get a discount on my Anbernic order as well. I’ll probably order more items from AliExpress in the future but with Amazon free shipping I’m not sure how often that will be. I always prefer buying from Amazon, but at least now I have a second site to compare prices with, at least with items that come from China anyway.
6 replies on “AliExpress Ain’t That Bad!”
A lot of products that I find on Amazon, cost considerably less on Aliexpress. And I am almost pretty sure they’re the exact same product
For example, I buy a specific rubber strap for my Moonswatches, and that costs about $15 on Amazon. On Ali, it costs about $4
Yes, this makes total sense because a lot of people try to hustle by doing something called “dropshipping”. They basically create a store somewhere else or their own website with products available on Alibaba and then sell it for a premium. After each sale order, they go and order it from there and put the address of the customer (they can also automate this).
I’ve been using AliExpress for about 4–5 years now, and it’s been a pretty solid experience overall. Back in the day, packages used to arrive at either the local area post office or Masael post office, and they’d notify you via WhatsApp to come pick it up. But recently, they’ve started delivering directly to your home, which is a huge convenience!
With their low prices and mostly free or super cheap shipping (usually around $2–3), I still prefer ordering from them. I’ve placed over 200 orders in the past few years, and only 2–3 packages ever got lost—but I always received a refund. Definitely worth it for the value you get.
I bought a lot of cables, cable ties and and small tools from them and they were almost always $5-10 cheaper than Amazon US for similar products. The packages usually took 7 working days to arrive on average. Beware of scam products though. The only thing I didn’t like is they didn’t accept my own custom domain email for sign up which is bizarre and I was forced to use my old Gmail account.
ahhh that might explain it cuz initially I was singing up with my @248am email
I have also been using Aliexpress for the past year. Some shipments do take time but overall a very pleasent experience. one time I was notified and refunded automatically because the seller didn’t upload a tracking number into Aliexpress – mind you that i completely forgot that i placed the order and was surprised that it was all done automatically for me.
I think its a great app especially like you said if things are already made in China. Two things i am surprised by that i bought are ; my Colmi ring and Automatic curtain robots that open and close the curtains at my home. Both run on decent apps and respond very well.