What Is Ali Express?

If you’ve never heard of it before, you might be wondering – what is Ali Express? 

Put simply, Ali Express is an online platform that connects businesses with products to sell, with consumers who want to buy them. Ali Express is based in China, as are a lot of the businesses who sell on there. You can find just about anything on Ali Express, from electronics to tools to bathroom fixtures.

So in many ways, Ali Express is similar to Amazon and eBay – why not buy directly from there? The simple answer is that the products on Ali Express tend to be quite a bit cheaper. The trade-off for that price saving is that since most of the businesses are based in China, that’s where the goods often ship from, which means they can sometimes take a little longer to get to you than anything shipped domestically. In our view, that’s not a huge issue, but it’s worth knowing this up front.

So, why have we made this blog about Ali Express’ ultralight backpacking gear in particular? Well, mainly because we really rate Ali Express Backpacking gear! It’s decent quality gear at a very low price point. Many of the pieces of gear we review on this site are (we feel) comparable to big western ultralight brands such as MSR, Thermarest and others. 

If you are looking at getting into ultralight camping, but don’t want to spend eye-watering sums of money on gear, then Ali Express is a great place to get started! Check out our reviews to see some of our top-rated stuff.