Shop details for Banggood

Banggood is a Chinese gadget shop with headquarters in Guangzhou (China). Banggood has several great features including warehouses in the US and England for quicker shipping around the world, the possibility to order without opening an account on its website, and a very well organized homepage, making it one of the best choices for a Chinese online shop. Its Alexa ranking of 3.793 - meaning it's one of the 4.000 most visited websites worldwide - is proof of its popularity and puts it in the same territory as DX.com and Fasttech. Banggood specializes in hobby supplies, gadgets, trinkets, and toys.

Banggood's website: get gadgets, consumer electronics and even fashion and jewelry from China

Experience with Banggood

Banggood is one of the biggest and longest-standing gadget shops in China. As a result, it shouldn’t be surprising that we were very satisfied with its customer service after placing several orders. Banggood’s delivery estimates are generally correct and all of our packages arrived on time. Further pros and cons include...

Payment

One of Banggood's most convenient features is that you don’t have to create an account to order, you can simply pay with PayPal. Paying with PayPal means you’re on the safe side and can get your money back through PayPal’s buyer protection in case of delivery problems. PayPal will refund your money up to 40 days after completing a payment.

There are certain advantages to creating a Banggood account, however. For one, you are only able to pay via credit card (Visa, Maestro, Mastercard) with an account on Banggood.

You can contact merchants on live chat, on the forum or via e-mail. We tried the live chat and Forums to communicate and got a swift response, each time within about 3 to 10 hours. One thing to remember, however, is that the time difference may lead to longer response times if you're not careful. Noon in New York is 1am in Guangzhou!

Supported payment methods:

• PayPal (Our recommendation!)
• Credit card
• Boleto
• Qiwi Wallet
• Webmoney

Delivery times, tracking and shipping

Shipping times are easily the worst part about ordering goods from China, but Banggood's warehouses all over the world mean that you can cut your package's EPA in half if you order something in stock at your local warehouse. What's better: all of the companies functions are still centralized in China, so its always easy to get help, even if your package is shipping from a foreign warehouse!

Now the bad news: you have to wait until check out to find out if your item is stored in your local warehouse, so you don't always have control over how long you'll have to wait. The Standard Shipping from China, however, is still free, and there's always express shipping available for an extra fee. With express shipping, your items usually arrive within 2-7 workdays.

Another nice feature is that, even with standard shipping, you can follow your packages on the Banggood order-tracking site. If you don't get a tracking number, it's not always possible to track is step-by-step, but by entering your order number and e-mail address you can see the current status of processing.

In this screen shot you can see that Banggood took its sweet time between paypal payment and shipping - but this was an exception in our experience. If you pay the extra fee for the tracking number, you can follow your order's voyage around the world after it's been shipped off from Banggood.

Special shipping option: Netherland Direct Mail

A special feature of Banggood is its "Netherland Direct Mail" shipping. This costs usually only a fraction more than Air Mail Register but arrives way faster in Europe. The particularity of Netherland Direct Mail is that packages are shipped directly to the Netherlands and from there shipped to the European shipping address, so that it will only take between 1 - 2 weeks for the delivery. The only disadvantage of this method is that there is no tracking number for Netherland Direct Mail - but we haven't had any problems with this shipping method so far and, according to different review forums and the reviews of our readers, they seem pretty reliable. So, if you have the option to choose this method during your checkout process, and you're shipping to Europe, then we recommend you use it as it is worth its extra cost - it's a nice combination of standard and expedited shipping.

Keep in mind that you still have to pay for customs and VAT even though it is shipped via the Netherlands. The original sender in China is listed on your package, so you might still have to pay some fees to your customs office or mail man. But it is our experience that customs and VAT have to payed more seldom if you pick this shipping option.

As always, it's not advisable to have your packages shipped to a PO Box, as some post offices won't always accept packages using bubble wrap packaging (a common practice in China).

Banggood and customs

Contrary to other Chinese shops, Banggood is very professional and declares packages very carefully. We didn't have to make an unwarranted visit at customs office yet. Nevertheless, one should be aware that customs does random checks on well-declared packages from China.

Naturally you still have to pay for the usual VAT and customs, depending on your order value. If you order for more than 26€ (yes, not 22€ - we explain this in our information section under the category tax), you'll have to pay VAT to your mail man and if you order for more than 250€, you'll probably have to pay customs fees. But this depends on the exact products you ordered.

For shipments entering the US, extra taxes and fees on your product are a possible, if not entirely common, side-effect of international ordering. Not every item is taxed when entering the country, but the majority are only subject to a nominal processing fee of between $2 and $9 when entering the country. The amount to be paid, however, can vary widely from nothing to $495 depending on the product and how it's sent. If you are concerned about your item, or are planning to order goods in excess of $100, it is worth it to check with the Customs Office at the port of entry (likely Los Angeles or San Francisco, unless you're using AirMail) to confirm any extra taxes.

Any extra taxes or duty on your shipment will either be paid at your door when the mailman drops it off, or the package may be held at your local post office. In which case, you will need to go pick it up and pay any applicable fees in person.

Special features

Besides warehouses outside of China and Hong Kong, which are definitely a real highlight, you get another feature on Banggood: After opening an account on Banggood you can automatically keep track of your orders with a value of $25+ throughout the delivery process. The back end for registered users is very well designed like you're used to from big American e-commerce websites (e.g. amazon or ebay). Here you can get an overview of your previous orders ("My orders"), your "preorders" or your "Wishlist".

A clear overview of orders - still a rare sight in Chinese online-shops

You can even create an account via Twitter or Facebook - but we had some bad experiences with this. Several weeks after our application, we got a bunch of spam up on our Twitter feed.

Banggood Points

Another special feature are the Banggood Points, which you gain after every new order. You can see the collected points under the section "My Points".

"My Points" is supposed to keep customers loyal to Banggood - but the savings are minimal

If you collected enough points, you can generate your own coupons in several "points zones". If you collected 150 points, you can receive a $1-discount coupon. If you order frequently in China, you will notice that regular coupons, especially our exclusive coupons, offer a better bargain than these coupons. Meaning that collecting these points isn't really worth it.

The video section of the site is highly recommended. It has, at least partially, better content than some video streaming sites. You can get an honest opinion from other customers on items you’re interested in. Try watching the videos, because we suspect that some written reviews can’t be trusted or weren’t written with the same care that the videos were created with.

Conclusion

Banggood is a well-established Chinese online shop. It features a vast array of products and warehouses in Europe and North America. Furthermore, it is continuously improving its customer support and web presence. Customers can save a lot of money with Banggood’s frequent coupons and promotions, and, in some cases, can save a HUGE amount of shipping time compared to other Chinese online-shops.

Alternatives

Alternative 1:	Dealextreme		Dealextreme has an amazing product selection
Alternative 2:	FastTech		will also surprise you with its range of electronic products

Banggood Coupon

Aside from current coupons that you can find on our page, there are exclusive coupons that will be placed automatically into your Banggood account. Another way to get extra coupons is to sign up to Banggood’s newsletter. Most coupons will have conditions such as a minimum order value. Before confirming your order, you should consider which coupon or promo code would mean the biggest savings for you.

For smaller sums or coupons connected to certain items, it is usually more helpful to use a coupon with a set $-discount and for bigger orders (see the example below) it makes usually more sense to use a voucher with a percentage discount.

We're constantly checking the coupons, so you can find the best Banggood specials right here. But if we really missed a coupon, then we would love it to get a message from you!