Finding Items and Shopping on Taobao Website and App

This guide will provide you with an easy to follow step-by-step instructions on how to find an item(s) on Taobao website and App.

Finding Items and Shopping on Taobao Website

TLDR: Step-by-Step-Instructions Link with Screenshots

Step 1: Visit Taobao and sign in to your account.

Step 2.: Taobao removed the image search option from their website in July 2022. You can still image-search using a chrome extension. Visit this link “AliPrice Search by image for TB” to add the extension. Then, (1)click “Add to Chrom,” and (2) “Add extension.”

Step 3: Open the product page that contains the item you want to find.

Step 4: Right-click on the image of the item, select “AliPrice Search by image for TB, ” then, “Search by image on Taobao”

Step 5: Taobao listings will be displayed on the left. Select the listing of your choice. Then, an Aliprice page will open up. Sometimes it may take you a few or multiple tries to find the item you want. Consider this as Taobao’s charm and enjoy the thrill of the hunt.

Step 6: Click “Go to Taobao”

Step 7: You are now in Taobao. If the product page is in Chinese, translate it using Google translate by right click and selecting “Translate to English.”

Step 8: Select the size and the style you wish to order. Select “Buy now” if you want to buy just one item or select “Add to cart” If you want to build a haul.

Step 9: The product is now added to your cart. You may continue to shop or check out. If you want to see what you have in your shopping cart, select “shopping cart” on the menu bar.

Step 10: Repeat Step 1-9 if you want to find more items to add to your cart.

Since image search has been removed from the website, I don’t use the website to find the items anymore. I use the app because the image search function is still available on the Taobao app.

Finding Items and Shopping on Taobao App

TLTR: Link to Step-by-Step Instructions with Screenshots

Step 1: Download Taobao App and sign in to your account. Remember that there is no in-app translation option in the app. If you want to translate a page, you need to take a screenshot and upload it to a translation app like Google Translate.

Step 2: Find and save an image of the item you want to “find” on your mobile device.

Step 3: Open Taobao app and locate the search bar at the top.

Step 4: Click the camera icon in the search bar. Select the saved product photo from your photo library.

Step: 5: Taobao will start searching for the product.

Step 6: Several listings will appear on the App. Select the listing of your choice.

Step 7.1: Pay attention to the 2 side-by-side orange buttons on the bottom right of the screen.

Step 7.2 The lighter orange button on the left is the “Add to cart” button. The darker orange button on the right is the “Buy now” button.

Step 8: To build a haul, click the lighter orange “Add to cart” button. The product option will appear. Select the option of your choice and click the orange button at the bottom to confirm your selection.

Step 9: Access or view your cart by clicking the shopping cart button on the top right of the screen.

Step 10: Select the “…” at the far top right corner of the screen to return to the homepage or access/view other options including your shopping cart.

I use the app to buy or find products but when I want to edit or add payment and shopping information, I opt to use the website.

Relevant Taobao guides:

• How to sign up for a Taobao account on desktop and app and how to avoid getting blocked by Taobao
• Getting a warehouse address in China and paying for items on Taobao website directly
• Paying for items on Taobao app for people who already have a warehouse address saved in Taobao account

Taobao Codename Guide for Chinese Translations of Brands & Items #

As the regulation on Taobao tightens, rep vendors on Taobao have resorted to using ambiguous “codenames” to represent the brands to avoid being shut down, creating difficulties for non-Chinese speakers to locate the rep products they seek. The purpose of this document is to provide some colloquial Chinese translations/acronyms of brands to enable easier search for the items we want to find on Taobao. The guide will be divided into 3 sections:

1. General Chinese terms for clothing items, jewellery and shoes
2. Luxury brand codenames
3. Fashion/Designer brand codenames

To use this guide to find the item you are looking for, simply try to combine the type of item you are looking for from 1., and add it to the codenames for the brands from either 2 or 3.   For example: I’m looking for a Chanel Tweed Jacket:

1. Look for “Chanel” in 2. -> 小香
2. Look for “Tweed” and “Jacket” in 1. -> 粗花呢 + 夹克
3. End result: 小香 粗花呢 夹克 -> Goes into Taobao searchbox

Note: Some brands have different variations of codenames, for best results simply try searching with each one of them and it might yield different items. General Chinese terms for clothing items, jewellery and shoes

Luxury Brand Codenames

Note: Sometime simply censoring part of the brand name would also yield some results: For instance Dior as Di*r or Prada as Pr*da.

For designer clothing, sometimes adding “风格” (Style) after the brand’s original name would yield good results: For instance, Margiela风格 or Lemaire风格。

For most brands, it would also be a good idea to do an image search and it will yield some good rep results.

However beware of listings that use the same photos as other vendors as they are either marked up from the same factory or stealing others’ photos.

Fashion/Designer brand codenames

This section is for more mid-range fashion brands and newer designer brands

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