What you need to know about DHgate

 

With rising tariffs threatening the regular order of world trade, consumers have started to look for alternative methods to keep up their shopping habits. This is especially true for European and US-based consumers who are used to cheap products being readily available from Asia.

 

One of the winners of this process seems to be DHgate, a Chinese platform that was relatively unknown before. Until April 2025, when its download figures rose by 732% to 117,500, with 65,100 of those originating from the US.

 

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What is DHgate

Founded in 2004, DHgate is a Chinese B2B and B2C platform aiming to connect international small and medium-sized businesses as well as consumers with Chinese manufacturers. It works like a digital bridge, offering a wide array of products in categories from electronics, shoes, sports equipment and fashion to toys, jewellery, health, beauty, garden supplies and even wedding accessories for wholesale prices.

 

 

Screenshot of the homepage of dhgate.com

 

 

Besides favourable deals, DHgate also offers secure payment systems, encryption, buyer protection and two-factor authentication to buyers, while sellers can enjoy logistics and marketing support, as well as warehousing, customer service, store operations and even assistance with customs procedures.

 

Thanks to a user-friendly interface and scalable operations, DHgate can successfully handle orders ranging from a single product to wholesale quantities. This certainly contributes to its success with consumers and businesses alike.

 

DHgate doesn’t charge a listing fee, which means that sellers can post their product listings free of charge. However, transaction fees are charged with each sale, which is the main tier of revenue for DHgate. The platform also offers premium services for a fee, including marketing tools like enhanced listing visibility.

 

 

Why is DHgate special for Western consumers

The wide range of products offered at relatively low prices certainly make DHgate attractive in the eyes of Western consumers. The platform allows shoppers to bypass Western handlers and their retail markups and get directly to manufacturers. Theoretically, this may mean that they get the same fashion, electronics, home equipment, etc., products for a fraction of the price.

 

The attractiveness of this underlying factor is enhanced by the uncertainties stemming from the 145% tariffs imposed by the US government on imports arriving from China.

 

And let’s not forget another crucial element contributing to the recent success of DHgate amongst American and European consumers: social media.

 

 

Illustration of a social media influencer filming herself for a live stream video

 

 

International and Chinese influencers on TikTok have recently started a campaign talking to their followers about how many regular and luxury items are originally made in China, with luxury brands “only” putting a few finishing touches on the product in their home countries. According to these influencers, the very same items can be purchased for a fraction of the price on DHgate, albeit without designer logos.

 

This idea is not new, so much so that these lookalike products even have a name: dupes.

 

Find out all about designer dupes!

 

Take a look at this listing of a “designer” handbag sold for $31 on DHgate, and compare it to the similarly designed Louis Vuitton bag worth 2,250 euros (ca. $2,500).

 

 

Screenshot of a random product listing on dhgate.com

 

 

Screenshot of a random product listing on louisvuitton.com

 

 

The product offered on DHgate uses a very similar colour scheme and design elements to those traditionally employed by luxury designer Louis Vuitton. Although it’s clearly not the same, price-conscious consumers may be convinced by the attractive price of this dupe product to purchase it instead of the pricey original.

 

 

The dangers of DHgate for consumers and brands

As DHgate works with third-party sellers, consumers can’t expect the same degree of quality and service with every purchase they make.

 

Find out all about third-party sellers!

 

Some products may even be counterfeit, posing a danger to consumers’ health. And let’s not forget the problems consumers face when a counterfeit product is seized at customs: lost purchase price, potential legal proceedings and a lot of hassle for nothing.

 

| Some products may even be counterfeit, posing a danger to consumers’ health

 

In addition, some fraudsters may even use DHgate for phishing attempts, luring customers off-platform for transactions that jeopardise their sensitive data and void any buyer protection DHgate offers.

 

But consumers are not the only ones in harm’s way. Counterfeits, along with the above-mentioned problem of dupe products flooding the platform, are especially harmful for brands whose IP rights fraudulent sellers infringe upon.

 

DHgate currently has a 1.5 rating on Trustpilot, which indicates that customers are not entirely happy with the platform.

 

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But what can you do to counter the dangers DHgate brings for your brand?

 

 

Online brand protection on DHgate

While its newfound popularity certainly makes DHgate interesting, its operations are not particularly different from other marketplaces. This is good news: it means that established online brand protection measures can tackle the dangers it poses just as well as in the case of any other marketplace.

 

globaleyez’s marketplace monitoring service is the perfect way to detect and highlight potentially IP-infringing listings on DHgate (and on over 150 other marketplaces worldwide). Combined with hands-on human experience, traxster, our powerful software solution, flags listings that feature your brand’s keywords. Thanks to versatile filters, we can discard authorised listings and zero in on fraudulent ones.

 

In addition to automatic tracking, we also use OSINT research to widen our net and gather as much data as possible about the activities of fraudulent networks.

 

But product listings are not the only things posing problems for brands. Stolen images, like those featured in social media posts and ads, often contribute to consumers’ beliefs that they’re dealing with your brand and not with fraudsters.

 

This is why we developed our image monitoring service. infrimage, our powerhouse of a software, detects stolen or copied images anywhere on the internet, allowing us to clean up stray offers and connect the dots between seemingly independent sellers.

 

Sometimes we need to gather highly specific information about the origins of a product, or the identity of a seller. In these cases we usually recommend a test purchase that allows us to learn much more than what’s possible from a mere product listing. Since we document each of our actions with screenseal, our court-accepted screenshotting tool, we can provide you with legally admissible proof of any IP infringements on DHgate and anywhere else online.

 

Finally, with all the evidence secured, we demand the removal of the infringing product listing or any other content from DHgate.

 

 

Conclusion

It remains to be seen whether DHgate’s newfound popularity is a fluke or a lasting condition brands have to adapt to. In any case, it’s best to protect your invaluable IP assets from infringement on DHgate and everywhere else on the internet.

 

Contact us and let’s create a unique online brand protection programme for your brand!