AliExpress dropshipping means you list AliExpress products in your own store, and after a customer pays you, you place the same order on AliExpress with the customer's address; the AliExpress seller ships the parcel straight to them. You pay the seller upfront by card for every order, delivery is international, and the parcel goes through customs in your customer's country.
Most people get the math wrong: they count the gap between the AliExpress price and their own price and forget refunds to customers who gave up waiting, ad costs and fees. In 2025–2026 import rules for small parcels also changed in both the EU and the US, and those charges now sit inside every order. Below: the order flow, an illustrative calculation of ten orders, the new customs rules, and how to check a product and an AliExpress supplier.
When people ask about dropshipping from AliExpress
Usually someone sees a product on AliExpress for a fraction of its retail price at home and wonders whether they can resell it without buying stock. The next searches are "how to start dropshipping on AliExpress", "how to find AliExpress dropshipping suppliers", "can I make $1000 a month with dropshipping" and "why do so many dropshippers fail".
The key question is not where the product is cheapest. It is whether your customer will wait for an international parcel, and what is left of the price gap after refunds, ads and import charges. The answer decides whether you keep anything at all.
How AliExpress dropshipping works, step by step
The flow has four steps, and money only moves forward: from the customer to you, and from you to the AliExpress seller.
- The customer pays you. They order in your store and pay online. Cash on delivery does not work here: the AliExpress seller will not ship a parcel that is paid on receipt.
- You pay the seller. You place the order on AliExpress from your own account, enter the customer's name, phone and address, and pay by card.
- The parcel ships from China. The seller sends it straight to your customer. The tracking number appears in your AliExpress order: pass it on to the customer.
- The customer receives it. On the way the parcel clears customs in the customer's country. What is charged there, and who pays, is covered in the customs section below.
The AliExpress order is on your account, so you are the buyer there. If a parcel gets lost or arrives broken, you open the dispute with the seller, and you refund your customer yourself, without waiting for the dispute to end. To your customer you are the store, not AliExpress. How the dropshipping model works in general, with any supplier, is in the guide on how to start dropshipping.
How much you keep from one order
You keep your price minus the AliExpress checkout price, ads, payment fees and refunds. Refunds make the difference: a customer who gives up waiting gets the full price back from you, while the money you paid the AliExpress seller does not always come back.
Illustrative example for the arithmetic; the figures are not market prices. The product costs €10 at AliExpress checkout, shipping and VAT included. You sell it for €30, ads cost €9 per order, and your payment provider takes 3%. Out of ten customers, one does not wait for the parcel: you refund €30, and the seller's money does not come back. Figures are before your own VAT and income tax.
| Line | Calculation | Amount, € |
|---|---|---|
| Customer payments | 10 × 30 | 300 |
| Refund to a customer | 1 × 30 | −30 |
| Payment fees | 300 × 3% | −9 |
| Paid to AliExpress sellers | 10 × 10 | −100 |
| Ads | 10 × 9 | −90 |
| You keep | 71 |
That is about €7 per order on a €20 price gap. Now add the EU charges for small parcels described below: a €3 customs duty per item and a €2 handling fee. If they land on your side, ten orders cost you €50 more, and €21 is left: about €2 per order unless you raise the price.
Two conclusions. First, put import charges and currency into the price from day one, not after the margin is gone: if you sell in euros or pounds and AliExpress charges you in another currency, the exchange rate moves every line of the table. Second, one refund takes most of what the other nine orders earned, so an honest delivery time on the product page is money, not politeness. How to set the markup so these costs are covered is in dropshipping markup; run your own numbers in the profit margin calculator, and if you are VAT-registered, convert net and gross prices with the VAT calculator.
Customs duty, VAT and fees on AliExpress parcels in the EU and the US
In the EU, VAT has been charged on every imported parcel since 1 July 2021, and since 1 July 2026 parcels up to €150 also pay a flat €3 customs duty per item. In the US, parcels worth $800 or less lost their duty-free status on 29 August 2025.
European Union. The rules split at €150 per consignment:
- Up to €150. VAT is usually collected at checkout through the Import One-Stop Shop (IOSS), so the AliExpress price for an EU address already includes it. If IOSS is not used, the carrier collects import VAT from the recipient. On top of that, from 1 July 2026 to 30 June 2028 a temporary €3 customs duty applies per item, which in practice means per line of the customs declaration.
- Handling fee. From 1 November 2026 a separate €2 Union handling fee applies per distinct item to every distance sale of imported goods, whatever the value, including parcels over €150. It is paid by the seller or the carrier, who may pass it on to the customer.
- Over €150. IOSS does not cover the parcel: import VAT and the normal customs duty for the product are charged at import, and the carrier usually collects them from your customer before delivery.
The rule for a dropshipper: keep one order under €150, and list one item per order line where you can. A customer who gets an unexpected customs bill at the door often refuses the parcel, and you have already paid the seller for it.
United States. Since 29 August 2025, imported goods worth $800 or less are no longer duty-free and pay all applicable duties, taxes and fees. CBP made the suspension indefinite by rules published on 24 June 2026, and the legal basis for the exemption is repealed from 1 July 2027. The duty depends on the product and where it was made, so there is no single number: before listing a product, check the total for a US address at AliExpress checkout and plug it into the table above.
How to choose AliExpress dropshipping suppliers and products
Choose products that travel well and rarely come back, and suppliers you have tested with your own order. Five checks before a product goes into your store:
- A test order to yourself. You see the real quality, the packaging and how many days the parcel took to reach you: put that delivery time on the product page.
- Buyer photo reviews. The seller's studio photos say nothing about quality; photos in buyer reviews do.
- Ships to your country. Check on the product page that the seller ships to your customers' country and which shipping option it is: not every seller ships everywhere.
- Under €150 per order. For EU customers, so the parcel stays in the simplified VAT regime and no customs bill arrives at the door.
- Light and not fragile. No size charts, no complex warranty: such products come back less often, and sending them back to China usually costs more than the product itself.
Do not sell copies of branded products: selling counterfeits infringes the trademark owner's rights, and marketplaces and payment providers block stores for it.
AliExpress or a local supplier
AliExpress suits testing a niche and selling rare products that local suppliers do not carry. For fast-moving products that customers want quickly, a dropshipping supplier with a warehouse in your market usually works better. Where to look for one and what to check is in how to find dropshipping suppliers.
| What we compare | AliExpress | Local supplier |
|---|---|---|
| How you pay | Upfront by card, for every order | Often on account, by invoice |
| Delivery | International, with customs | Domestic carrier, no customs inside the EU or the US |
| Returns | Dispute on AliExpress; shipping back to China rarely pays | The parcel goes back to the supplier's warehouse |
| Price | Changes with the seller and the exchange rate | Dropship price list, often with a recommended retail price |
| Availability | A seller can delist a product without notice | A price list or feed with stock you can update daily |
If you would rather import from China in bulk to your own warehouse instead of shipping parcels to customers, that is regular importing with a customs declaration: how to price such a shipment is in the guide to Chinese supplier price lists.
When to manage AliExpress products in software
When your catalog has dozens or hundreds of AliExpress products: a seller can change a price or delist a product on any day, exchange rates move daily, and you can no longer check that by hand.
In Elbuz, AliExpress products are collected the same way as from any other website, by the universal scraper: it fetches names, photos, specifications, prices and availability on a schedule on the server, and then your markup rules and stock statuses apply to them as to a regular supplier price list. The price in your store is recalculated when the AliExpress price changes, and delisted products stop selling. How to set it up is on the ecommerce web scraper page; what else can be automated, from supplier feeds to supplier orders, is in dropshipping automation.
Who it is not for: if you are testing a niche with five or ten products, software is overkill; a spreadsheet and a weekly manual price check are enough.
Elbuz web scraperProducts, prices and stock from supplier websites on schedule, 14 days free
Frequently asked questions
How can I start dropshipping on AliExpress?
Pick a few products, place a test order to yourself, list the products in your store with an honest delivery time, and take payment upfront. When an order comes in, buy the item on AliExpress with the customer's address and send them the tracking number.
Can I make $1000 a month with dropshipping from AliExpress?
It depends on what is left per order. With the illustrative €7 per order from the example above, €1,000 a month takes about 140 orders; with the new €5 per-item charges in the EU, about 480.
Why do so many dropshippers fail?
Most often because the full math was never done: refunds for slow delivery, ad costs and import charges eat the gap between the AliExpress price and the store price.
Can I dropship with $0?
Not really. The customer pays before you buy, so you need no stock, but you still pay for the store, the test orders and the ads that bring the first customers.
Can I be sued for dropshipping?
Yes, if you break the law like any other seller. To your customer you are the store, so complaints about delivery, quality and fakes come to you; selling counterfeits also exposes you to claims from the trademark owner.
Do I have to pay customs on AliExpress parcels?
In the EU, yes: VAT on every parcel and, since 1 July 2026, a €3 duty per item on parcels up to €150. In the US, parcels worth $800 or less have paid all applicable duties since 29 August 2025.
Sources
- Council Regulation (EU) 2026/382: temporary €3 customs duty per item on consignments up to €150, 1 July 2026 – 1 July 2028, applied per declaration line: EU Access2Markets, 30.06.2026.
- Union handling fee of €2 per distinct item on all e-commerce goods from outside the EU, regardless of value, from 1 November 2026: Irish Revenue, press release, 29.09.2026.
- VAT treatment of the €3 customs duty and the €2 Union handling fee; IOSS and special arrangements: European Commission, addendum to the VAT e-commerce explanatory notes, 06.10.2026.
- Removal of the €22 VAT exemption and two methods of VAT collection for consignments up to €150 from 1 July 2021: European Commission, customs formalities for low value consignments.
- Suspension of duty-free de minimis treatment for goods of $800 or less from all countries, effective 29 August 2025: U.S. Customs and Border Protection, fact sheet, 18.08.2025.
- Indefinite suspension by interim final rules of 24 June 2026; statutory termination on 1 July 2027: Federal Register, 24.06.2026, Federal Register, Low-Value Shipments, 08.10.2026.
Checked on 01.11.2026.
