Taobao’s Dramatic Transformation in This Year’s Double 11

2025-10-21 09:25:00 This Year’s Double 11, Taobao Undergoes Earth-Shattering Changes Another Double 11 is here, marking the 17th edition. However, in recent years, the promotion period has been getting longer, and the fatigue of merchants and consumers is obvious. Countless voices inside and outside the industry have questioned: Is Double 11 still necessary? Can it bring any new ideas? In fact, under the intersection and impact of the two epoch-making trends of big consumption and AI, both merchants and consumers in this Double 11 are destined to face unprecedented opportunities and challenges. Against this background, as the initiator of Double 11, Taobao Tmall has shown amazing courage—it is not just simply iterating gameplay, but undergoing earth-shattering changes from traffic logic to service experience. These changes will not only reshape the pattern of this promotion but may even redefine the form of future e-commerce promotions.

Double 11 Is Changing: Alibaba Uses AI to Rebuild Taobao

In the AI era, everything is worth doing again, including Double 11. At the recent Alibaba Cloud Conference, Alibaba CEO Wu Yongming pointed out that achieving General Artificial Intelligence (AGI) is inevitable and a starting point, and the ultimate goal is to develop Super Artificial Intelligence (ASI) that can self-iterate and comprehensively surpass humans. He predicted that in the future, every family, factory, and company will have many Agents and robots serving us 24 hours a day. Just as electricity once amplified the leverage of human physical strength, ASI will exponentially amplify the leverage of human intelligence, making people more powerful than ever before in history. This statement quickly became the focus of discussion inside and outside the industry.

This is not the first time Alibaba has revealed its ambition for AI. This year, the narrative of “All in AI” has driven its growth flywheel several times. The e-commerce sector, as Alibaba’s core business, is also becoming the best test field for AI implementation. As we all know, e-commerce is one of the industries closest to AI. As Alibaba’s most core business segment, Taobao Tmall relies on a world-leading technology base and holds 1 billion consumers and the world’s most abundant product library, naturally having the soil for large-scale AI application. At 8 PM tonight, Taobao Tmall Double 11 will officially go on sale. Previously, the Tmall Double 11 press conference revealed that this year will be the first Tmall Double 11 with full AI implementation.

On the merchant side, AI will reconstruct the logic of traffic distribution and “redo” the entire link of merchant operations. On one hand, the platform will use AI to more accurately understand and organize 2 billion products, increasing traffic matching efficiency by double digits. This includes a 20-percentage-point improvement in search relevance under complex semantics, a 10% increase in recommended information flow clicks, and a 12% increase in merchant advertising ROI. This means merchants will reach consumer groups more efficiently and accurately. On the other hand, brand operations on Tmall will be fully AI-driven, from business analysis, product operations, material production, to crowd operations… Almost all links can use AI to reduce costs and increase efficiency, saving tens of billions of costs for all merchants. It is revealed that Taobao has already formed an AI operation team for merchants to assist their operations. Relevant data shows that AI artists generate 200 million images/5 million videos per month, increasing product click-through rates by 10%; AI data analysis has generated over 10 million reports, receiving 85% merchant praise; AI customer service Dianxiaomi 5.0 helps merchants reduce costs by 20 million yuan daily and increase GMV by 19.12 million yuan.

For consumers, the implementation of AI has also greatly improved the shopping experience. First, this Double 11 will issue 50 billion yuan in consumer coupons to subsidize users, and some coupons will be uniformly decided and issued by the AI “Smart Benefit Engine”. Pilot data shows that the coupon conversion rate of the AI “Smart Benefit Engine” has increased by 15% compared to before, making consumption subsidies more precise. Second, AI plays a prominent role in assisting user decisions and facilitating shopping processes. In August and September this year, Taobao quietly tested two AI search products, AI Universal Search and AI Assistant. At the previous Double 11 press conference, six AI shopping guide applications were released at once to meet users’ shopping needs in different scenarios. Among them, “AI Universal Search” can accurately understand complex semantic expressions and provide shopping strategies; “AI Help Me Choose” can accurately screen products through dialogue guidance; “Pailitao” has been upgraded to multimodal AI search, realizing same-product price comparison and similar product recommendations for consumers; Taobao homepage search automatically generates “category lists” based on and can answer shopping questions in real time; “AI Try-On” supports users to try on favorite outfits with one click; each user will also get a customized “AI List”. Thus, with AI fully penetrating every link of traffic distribution, product operations, and user experience, Taobao Tmall is not only “rebuilding a Double 11” but also “rebuilding a Taobao”. The platform ecosystem will achieve a qualitative improvement, becoming more intelligent and efficient, and better understanding consumers and merchants.

Flash Purchase Booms, Ushering in the Era of Omnichannel Big Consumption

One of the biggest changes in this year’s e-commerce promotion is the strong entry of instant retail players. The addition of Meituan Flash Purchase during this year’s 618 allowed e-commerce promotions to achieve “delivery within half an hour” and made physical merchants no longer just onlookers of e-commerce promotions. On Alibaba’s side, with the popularity of Taobao Flash Purchase, the potential of deep integration of e-commerce and food delivery has begun to emerge, quietly rewriting the industry pattern. With Taobao Flash Purchase as the vanguard, Taobao has transitioned from an e-commerce platform to an “omnichannel” big consumption platform. This Double 11 is the first Double 11 after Taobao upgraded to a big consumption platform. Taobao Flash Purchase will work closely with Tmall to face this actual combat inspection.

It is understood that after the launch of Tmall Double 11, Taobao Flash Purchase will simultaneously launch preferential activities. On one hand, brand flagship stores can access Taobao Flash Purchase to achieve growth relying on the benefits of instant retail. The first batch of 37,000 brands and 400,000 stores have accessed Flash Purchase, covering industry leading brands such as Apple, Huawei, Uniqlo, and Decathlon. On the other hand, a large number of local life merchants will also seek breakthrough opportunities in the Double 11 e-commerce promotion. Currently, over 4 million local life service merchants have accessed Taobao Flash Purchase, which will also be the largest Double 11 participation scale for local life merchants.

For consumers, Flash Purchase brings the dual benefits of speed and discounts. The 50 billion yuan consumer coupon subsidies issued during the entire Tmall Double 11 period can not only be used for Tmall products but also for brand products that have opened Taobao Flash Purchase. Users can also use 88VIP consumer coupons to have flagship store genuine products delivered within minutes. Taobao Flash Purchase’s food delivery 50% off activity will also run through the entire Tmall Double 11 period. 88VIP users can receive up to 4 food delivery 50% off red envelopes daily, and later will unlock the of an additional 5% off on top of discounts. All users can participate in drawing over 10 million free order benefits.

Previously, Fan Yu, chairman and CEO of Ele.me, explained the synergy logic between Taobao Flash Purchase and e-commerce: In the super traffic field of Double 11, Flash Purchase and e-commerce businesses complement each other and benefit each other. High-frequency food delivery users will naturally promote browsing and purchasing due to the Double 11 atmosphere on Taobao when solving three-meal needs; users participating in the promotion will also naturally increase consumption of tea, late-night snacks, etc. on Flash Purchase. Data has verified this point. This Double 11, Taotian is divided into pre-sale and spot sales stages. The pre-sale stage started on October 15, and the “spot sales period” started at 8 PM on October 20. Data on the first day of October 15 shows that Taobao Flash Purchase’s late-night snack orders in 270 cities nationwide increased by over 200% year-on-year, supermarket convenience orders increased by 670%, and categories such as drinks, baking, fruits, and fresh produce all achieved 2x growth. At the same time, a large number of brands have achieved visible growth by accessing Flash Purchase services. The transactions of 3C digital, personal care, clothing, and other industry brands on Taobao Flash Purchase have increased by over 290% compared to the same period last year.

Now it seems that Alibaba’s large investment in Taobao Flash Purchase at that time was obviously not just aimed at the food delivery business or the instant retail industry. Instead, taking advantage of this opportune time, it food delivery, e-commerce, and other businesses in one go, allowing consumers to seamlessly buy everything on the same platform, or rather, making consumers’ first reaction to open Taobao when they want to buy anything. Once, relying on its status as the “elder brother” of e-commerce, Taobao once firmly occupied the minds of netizens, and “Taobao” once became a synonym for online shopping. However, with the intensification of competition in the e-commerce industry, various competitors have emerged, which inevitably impacted Taobao’s position. Building a omnichannel big consumption platform with multiple business synergies may also be Alibaba’s attempt to regain user minds through ecological synergy and a necessary path for Alibaba to return to the peak. At the same time, this is also Alibaba’s inevitable response to the “era of big consumption”. With the fragmentation of consumption scenarios and diversification of needs, a single-mode e-commerce platform can no longer meet user needs. The integration of online and offline, and the combination of instant needs and planned shopping are the inevitable trends of the future.

Double 11 Needs More Benefits

The 17-year-old Double 11 stands at the crossroads of “AI + big consumption”. AI makes it smarter, Flash Purchase makes it more convenient, but challenges still exist: Are consumers willing to pay continuously for the increasingly long promotion cycle? Can new dividends completely alleviate the industry’s fatigue and make Double 11 regain vitality?

After all, there is no eternal business model, only constantly evolving user needs. We still need to wait for the dust to settle after Double 11 to see the final effect of this set of tactics. However, from an industry perspective, Taobao’s exploration is still quite valuable: when online traffic peaks, AI becomes the key tool for efficiency improvement; when e-commerce growth slows down, “instant retail + e-commerce” is used to open up new battlefields. Reconstructing the shopping experience with AI and redefining consumption boundaries with Flash Purchase, Taobao’s exploration not only drives its own long-term growth but also meets more user needs. At the same time, the platform no longer competes on price but on experience, precision, and convenience, which also brings more stable benefits to merchants.

Of course, honestly, keeping Double 11 vibrant is still a topic that needs continuous research. If you want to continue winning people’s hearts, promotions may need more benefits and stimuli. In addition to technological upgrades and business expansion, it is more necessary to return to the essence of promotions, truly create value for users, and make consumption easier and happier.