How AI is Reshaping The 11 11 Shopping Festival
The world’s largest shopping event is getting a major AI-powered upgrade. Alibaba's 2025 11.11 Global Shopping Festival, which kicked off on October 15th, marks a significant milestone as the company's first large-scale deployment of generative AI in e-commerce, aiming to create real value for both shoppers and sellers.
AI Supercharges Core E-Commerce Functions
One of the biggest breakthroughs this year involves Taobao and Tmall using AI to enrich and index their massive product catalog, which contains over two billion listings. Building on this foundation, Large Language Models (LLMs), post-trained on Alibaba’s own Qwen models, have been integrated into the core search and recommendation engines. This allows the search engine to understand complex, conversational queries more comprehensively, while AI-driven recommendations lead to more exciting product discoveries.
The results are impressive, with a double-digit improvement in result relevance for complex questions and a double-digit increase in click-through rates for certain recommendation scenarios.
“Our integration of generative AI drove significant improvements on top of an already mature tech stack,” said Kaifu Zhang, Vice President of Alibaba Group. “We are confident that AI will deliver even greater value across Taobao and Tmall. This year marks the first of many future 11.11s with generative AI deployment at scale.”
This move is part of Alibaba's wider strategy to transform its businesses with AI, backed by a planned US$53 billion investment in AI infrastructure announced in February 2025. While many tech companies are still exploring the returns on their AI investments, Alibaba is already seeing tangible results in its core commerce operations.
A Virtual AI Team for Millions of Merchants
For the tens of millions of businesses operating on Taobao and Tmall, Alibaba has upgraded its AI toolkit to create a virtual “AI team,” helping them manage the busy shopping season more efficiently and cost-effectively.
Key tools include:
- Upgraded AIGC Suite: This AI-Generated Content suite now features video generation, allowing merchants to create dynamic videos from static product photos. The suite produces around 200 million images and 5 million videos monthly, contributing to a product click-through rate increase of over 10%.
- Proactive Business Advisor: The AI Business Advisor has evolved from a simple dashboard into a proactive analyst, generating tailored recommendations for everything from dynamic pricing to inventory plans. It has already generated ten million analytical reports for merchants.
- Enhanced Customer Service: The AI-powered customer service assistant, “Dianxiaomi,” was upgraded in September 2025 and now helps merchants save RMB20 million in daily operational costs.
Additionally, an AI-powered bidding engine is helping sellers optimize their marketing spend, driving up marketing ROI by 12%.
Crafting a Smarter Journey for a Billion Shoppers
AI is also streamlining the consumer journey on Taobao and Tmall, making the shopping experience more intuitive and personalized.
Shoppers can now use conversational search to ask highly specific questions, such as, “my two-and-a-half-year-old daughter does not like to brush her teeth. What should I buy?”
AI search results for children’s brushing teeth inquiry
An AI Personal Shopping Assistant, embedded in search results and product pages, acts like a real-life guide, helping customers compare items and find the best deals. For 11.11, the assistant even features dedicated “AI wish lists” to provide personalized shopping lists and navigate festival deals.
Furthermore, the “Snap and shop” feature allows users to search with a photo, instantly receiving tiered recommendations by price and quality. The AI can intelligently extract text from images and use both visual and textual cues for a more accurate search—a feature particularly useful for helping elderly individuals understand product packaging.
“Snap and Shop” feature
Virtual try-on technology has also received a major upgrade. Using just a single photo, the system creates a lifelike digital avatar and realistically drapes clothing on it, accurately reproducing fabric textures, colors, and the natural way materials fold and stretch.
AI Reimagines the Future of E-Commerce
This year’s 11.11 is more than just a shopping festival; it’s a massive, real-world demonstration of how AI can be woven into the very fabric of e-commerce. By focusing on practical applications that create tangible value, Alibaba is showcasing a future where shopping is more intuitive for consumers and selling is more efficient for businesses of all sizes.
