Want to build a multi-vendor marketplace similar to Alibaba? You’re at the right place. This comprehensive craft will help you explore everything about Alibaba, from its introduction and business model to subsidiaries, revenue model, key features, steps to build, investment needed, and the right solution you can choose.
However, before we dive deep, let’s explore why build an eCommerce platform similar to Alibaba?
According to Statista, Alibaba Group recorded revenue of approximately $137.3 billion (996.35 billion yuan) in the fiscal year ending March 31, 2025. You can see a continuous growth in Alibaba’s revenue from 2015 to 2025.
What attracts entrepreneurs more to build a marketplace like Alibaba is its diversified revenue channels and business models. It generates revenue through multiple sources and drives consistent growth via its strategic business model.
Moreover, by building a marketplace like Alibaba, you will not just create a centralized digital platform to connect buyers and sellers, but can extend your business beyond. Let’s explore how to create a website like Alibaba.
Alibaba is a leading B2B multi-vendor marketplace that enables buying and selling products in bulk. The platform is specially designed for B2B trade. It connects businesses (buyers) that prefer good margins with suppliers (vendors) seeking large quantity orders.
There are millions of active buyers, manufacturers, suppliers and wholesalers listed and registered on Alibaba. The marketplace handles approximately 300,000 trades daily. On the one hand, vendors connect with millions of global buyers. On the other hand, buyers also gain access to a wide variety of products from distinct categories and niches.
Alibaba’s offerings are not limited to products; it also extends to services, cloud computing, entertainment, logistics, finance, artificial intelligence, and more.
In short, Alibaba Group is a one-stop destination for individuals and businesses that offers a comprehensive digital solution, from selling products in bulk to selling to individual customers, providing cloud computing services to leveraging AI products, enabling a payment system to offering loans and providing a video streaming platform to making films.
Alibaba is a dedicated B2B multi-vendor marketplace that works as an intermediary between businesses. It connects businesses, including buyers and sellers, to trade in bulk. Manufacturers, distributors and suppliers primarily from China list their products and connect with buyers across the world. Buyers, on the other hand, visit the marketplace and find products at a good value.
Buyers can also take post-delivery actions, such as providing feedback on the product or supplier, or contacting customer support for any complaints, concerns, or queries.
| Admin controls and manages the entire marketplace’s operations, including user management, payment management, order management, role management, return and complaint management, marketing, promotions and much more. |
However, alongside product sales, the Alibaba Group follows a diversified business model that makes it an ideal inspiration for entrepreneurs and business owners who tap into the eCommerce world and extend their offerings beyond. Let’s explore some widely recognized subsidiaries or businesses operated by Alibaba Group that contribute to its growth and expansion.
| Subsidiary | Founded Year | Key Offerings |
| 1688.com | April 1999 | A Chinese B2B eCommerce platform focused on the domestic market. |
| Taobao | May 2003 | A consumer-to-consumer (C2C) marketplace popular across China. |
| AliPay | February 2004 | A widely used digital payment service in China. |
| Youku | December 2006 | A major online video platform, often compared to YouTube. |
| Alimama | November 2007 | A digital marketing and monetization platform by Alibaba Group. |
| Tmall | April 2008 | A B2C platform featuring high-quality products from top brands. |
| Aliyun (Alibaba Cloud) | September 2009 | Global cloud computing solutions provider. |
| AliExpress | April 2010 | A global B2C eCommerce platform connecting buyers with Chinese suppliers. |
| Lazada | May 2012 | A leading Southeast Asian eCommerce marketplace. |
| Cainiao | May 2013 | A smart logistics network enabling fast domestic and cross-border deliveries. |
| DingTalk | December 2014 | An enterprise communication and collaboration platform. |
Whether you are a buyer or a seller, user registration and product listing on Alibaba are free. However, its diversified revenue models ensure steady income for the business.
The platform primarily generates revenue through advertising, membership fees, and commission on transactions. While some platforms like Tmall and AliExpress charge commissions on sales, others like Taobao and Alibaba itself rely more on advertising and subscription fees.
In addition, Alibaba Group earns money from its extended services such as cloud computing, logistics, and more. Let’s get an overview of the revenue model of Alibaba below:
Alibaba Revenue Model: How Does Alibaba Make Money?
Alibaba and its sister eCommerce platform enable the selling of products in retail and wholesale. These platforms generate revenue from multiple revenue streams. Tmall and Taobao are leading eCommerce platforms that generate a vast amount of revenue for Alibaba. Below are a few revenue streams that contribute to the company’s revenue.
Primarily, Alibaba offers two different pricing plans: basic and standard. The subscriber can choose either a quarterly or an annual plan. These membership plans provide access to premium services and features, offering subscribers several exclusive benefits. Alibaba’s premium membership program 88VIP has continued to gain traction among its members.

Alimama is the advertising platform that analyses data across platforms and enables targeted marketing across the Alibaba ecosystem.
Suggested Read: How Does Alibaba Make Money : A Detailed Guide
Aliyun, Alibaba’s cloud computing arm, has reported year-on-year revenue growth. It provides services like computing, storage, data management and AI solutions. It enables businesses to choose subscription plans or incur charges based on services used, pay-as-you-go.
AI-related products remain key growth drivers for Alibaba Cloud. In the first year of 2025, Alibaba Cloud reported revenue of $16.26 billion. Moreover, by analyzing the rapid adoption of AI products, Alibaba has planned to invest in cloud and AI infrastructure to sustain its growth and expansion.
Cainiao is one of the world’s largest cross-border eCommerce logistics services providers. It’s one of Alibaba’s leading revenue sources. At the same time, Cainiao is also one of the fastest-growing units.
Cainiao generates revenue from services including warehousing, transportation, pick-up services, last-mile delivery and more. The highlight is that Cainiao generates a significant portion, about 70% from external sources and the remaining 30% of revenue comes from serving Alibaba’s internal needs.
Alibaba generates revenue from Alipay and other financial services. However, Alipay is now part of Alibaba’s financial services known as Ant Financial. It offers a range of payment and financial services. These services include payment processing, micro-loans, digital banking, wealth management and more. Moreover, Ant Group generates revenue via a combination of fees, interests, and transactional charges.
Alibaba Digital Media and Entertainment is another source that generates revenue through subscription fees, licensing, and advertising. This segment of Alibaba includes Youku, a video streaming platform; Alibaba Music, a music division focusing on copyrights and more related to the industry; Alibaba Pictures produces films and TV shows; AliSports, UC web and more.
They all drive revenue for Alibaba in several ways. Such as Youku generates revenue through subscriptions and advertisements and Alibaba Pictures generates revenue by producing films and TV shows.
The table below defines the revenue share of the Chinese eCommerce conglomerate Alibaba Group by segment. You can see the percentages of Alibaba’s revenue in the second quarter of 2025.
| Alibaba’s Segment/Subsidiary/Business | Revenue Percentage |
| China Commerce Retail | 47.88% |
| All others | 23.66% |
| Cloud Intelligence Group | 13.49% |
| International Commerce Retail | 11.47% |
| Quick Commerce | 5.7% |
| International Commerce Wholesale | 2.56% |
| China Commerce Wholesale | 2.46% |
Operating an online multi-vendor marketplace requires the necessary features and functionality to ensure a seamless and hassle-free experience for users. Similarly, being a leading B2B multi-vendor marketplace, Alibaba offers advanced out-of-the-box features and functionality.
It enables users to navigate complete transactions effortlessly. On Alibaba, two different users primarily participate: buyers and sellers. Let’s explore user-wise key features of Alibaba below:
Buyer is the first; at the same time, it’s the end user on the marketplace. The role of a buyer begins with a product search to end with leaving a review and ratings. Below are buyer-specific features of Alibaba:
In addition, buyers on Alibaba can filter products at multiple levels to get more precise and relevant search results. These filters may include supplier country/region, supplier features, store reviews, certification and more. However, the filters can vary depending on the product category and types.

Alibaba also enables product search using images. Buyers can upload, paste or drag and drop images to search. They can even take snaps using Alibaba Lens to find results.

Vendors on Alibaba are manufacturers, suppliers and wholesalers who list and sell products on the platform. Alibaba brings all the necessary features for vendors. Enabling them to create unique storefronts to process and deliver orders, they perform all the tasks seamlessly. Let’s explore vendor-specific features of Alibaba below:

In order to enable real-time communication, Alibaba also provides the AliSupplier app that allows suppliers to respond to buyers immediately, contributing to higher conversion chances.


Admin is the marketplace operator that operates, manages and grows the platform. From managing users to ensuring seamless operations, analyzing reports to processing payments, promoting business to acquiring users, implementing emerging technologies to taking care of updates, the admin requires all the necessary features to handle these operations.
Similarly, a B2B multi-vendor marketplace like Alibaba supports all the admin features that ensure seamless marketplace operations. However, Alibaba’s admin features are not officially available. Yet, you can check out these features required for the B2B marketplace admin:
Whether it’s about the number of users, transactions, tax, commission, or more, the reports showcase everything they need. In addition, by analyzing these data and insights, the admin can plan strategies and grow the marketplace.
Deciding on the cost to build a marketplace like Alibaba requires several considerations. The price can vary widely depending on factors such as the approach, technological requirements, features, functionality, integrations and other specific needs or complexity of the marketplace. In short, building a marketplace like Alibaba can cost anywhere between $10,000 – $1,00,000 or more.
However, you can build a B2B marketplace like Alibaba in two popular ways: build from scratch or choose a readymade solution.
In this approach, you build an Alibaba-like marketplace from the ground up, which requires a significant amount of time, resources and money.
Choosing a readymade B2B marketplace software can significantly reduce costs and timelines. Suppose you’re building an Alibaba-like eCommerce platform using Yo!Kart B2B, a readymade and dedicated B2B solution. The price can drop unexpectedly from thousands of dollars to a few hundred dollars.
| Our Recommendation: Building a B2B marketplace using a readymade solution like Yo!Kart B2B can significantly reduce the cost. What makes it a preferred choice is that it offers a similar level of control and customization flexibility to custom development. |
B2B eCommerce has shown substantial growth. According to the International Trade Administration, the global B2B eCommerce market size is expected to reach $36 trillion by 2026. The data indicates it’s the right time for entrepreneurs and startups to take advantage of this ever-growing eCommerce landscape.
If you are planning to build an eCommerce platform like Alibaba, it can be a game-changing decision. At the same time, you need to be careful to avoid potential threats to your business, investment and marketplace idea.
Below are a few time-tested steps suggested by industry experts to help you build a marketplace similar to Alibaba.
Alibaba is a dedicated B2B marketplace platform that connects manufacturers, suppliers, and wholesalers with global businesses that want to buy products in bulk at affordable rates. When planning to launch a marketplace like Alibaba, you need to discover a unique idea that can give your marketplace a competitive edge.
Hence, conduct thorough market research, analyze competitors, identify gaps, discover pain points, find an emerging market, understand targeted customers, and define a niche.
Moreover, conduct in-depth market research on Alibaba. It will also help you understand the areas and offerings where Alibaba itself is lacking and its customers are looking for an alternative that can meet their specific needs.
In addition, conducting market research will also give you an idea about the technology, budget and timeline required to build a B2B multi-vendor marketplace like Alibaba.
If you want to build a marketplace like Alibaba, it clearly indicates a B2B eCommerce platform. However, when it comes to generating revenue for your eCommerce business, careful consideration is required. You can not simply decide on revenue generation streams that others are following.
Every business idea is unique. Hence, it requires a distinct approach to its monetization model considering the target audience, transaction type, users’ journey and more. Deduce with the revenue model that best suits your marketplace and its audience.
However, below are a few well-known revenue models marketplaces generate revenue from:
You can choose any of the following or can implement a unique money-making idea that can help your business stand ahead and grow.
Operating a multi-vendor marketplace like Alibaba requires a comprehensive set of features and functionality to ensure seamless transactions on the platform. You need to define all the necessary features, functionality and services considering all the marketplace participants, their roles, operations and processes. The features listed below are critical when building a multi-vendor marketplace like Alibaba:
In addition to the above features, you can incorporate features and functionalities required specifically according to your business requirements.
Building an MVP is a great way to validate your marketplace idea with a minimum investment. MVP (Minimum Viable Product) is the basic version of your full-fledged marketplace. It’s primarily designed to validate an idea, understand the user’s journey, and identify improvement areas.
It supports all the necessary features and functionality required to complete transactions for all user types. It significantly reduces the cost and time and helps entrepreneurs and business owners avoid potential threats to their ideas and investments.
An MVP is primarily intended to introduce its early adopters who explore and provide valuable feedback. Businesses implement feedback in order to improve the final product. MVPs are generally scalable platforms that can be expanded and grown as per the specific requirements. Ultimately, it contributes to saving time, money and resources alongside validating the marketplace idea.
Yo!Kart can be one of the best turnkey solutions to introduce your marketplace MVP, like Alibaba. It helps reduce the money and time required to launch a marketplace.
In the final step, if you are satisfied with your marketplace MVP results, you can expand it into a full-fledged marketplace and launch. However, the job is not done yet. Operating a multi-vendor marketplace similar to Alibaba or any other requires a continuous effort.
From onboarding the maximum number of vendors to attracting more buyers and implementing new features to incorporating trends, your active participation is critical. Moreover, marketing and advertising are also one of those critical requirements that help you gain a competitive edge.
However, being a marketplace operator, you should always keep an eye on the users’ feedback, trends, and competitors to stay relevant, engaged and competitive.
Yo!Kart is a white-label multi-vendor marketplace software. This readymade solution is primarily focused on providing entrepreneurs with a solution that enables them to build and launch a multi-vendor marketplace at an affordable price. It comes with all the necessary features and functionality required to operate an eCommerce platform.
If you are one of those entrepreneurs who is looking for a dedicated B2B marketplace software to build a platform like Alibaba, Yo!Kart B2B is right there for you. It’s a dedicated B2B multi-vendor marketplace software that supports B2B specific features and allows businesses of all sizes to trade seamlessly.
Moreover, choosing Yo!Kart as your marketplace software offers more than just a digital platform. The solution is fully customizable and scalable. Hence, you can tailor the platform to your specific needs and expand your eCommerce business without worrying about infrastructure and additional expenses related to expansion.
In addition, Yo!Kart’s source code ownership and self-hosted nature offer complete control over your marketplace and data, making it an ideal and better alternative to building a marketplace from scratch.
In this informative guide on how to create a website like Alibaba, you have gone through every single detail about Alibaba. Starting from its history to understanding its business model, exploring Alibaba’s subsidiaries, features, and decoding its multiple and diversified revenue models.
In short, as an entrepreneur, you can collect all the necessary information about Alibaba that one should be aware of when building a B2B multi-vendor marketplace similar to it, including a step-by-step guide, costs and approaches to build.
I’m sure that if you are an entrepreneur planning to build a multi-vendor marketplace similar to Alibaba, you’ll consider YoKart, one of the most affordable and best readymade multi-vendor marketplace solutions.
Ans. No, Alibaba doesn’t charge commission from sellers on sales. However, it charges payment processing fees on payments that take place through Alibaba.
Ans. Alibaba generates revenue from other revenue streams like subscription charges, revenue from eCommerce subsidiaries, shipping services, payment and other financial services.
Ans. Yes, you can build an Alibaba-like B2B multi-vendor marketplace with Yo!Kart easily. Yo!Kart is a 100% white-label and readymade eCommerce solution that allows entrepreneurs and businesses to build their own eCommerce platform.
Ans. Yes, Alibaba is one of the top B2B multi-vendor marketplaces that enables businesses to trade in bulk online.
Ans. No, Yo!Kart doesn’t change any recurring fees or transactional charges. The solution is available at a one-time payment option. You can get a lifetime license to use Yo!Kart by paying once in a lifetime.
Ans. Alibaba has over 40 million active B2B buyers, over 200K suppliers, 200 million+ listings and 5,900 product categories according to Alibaba.
Ans. Yes, Alibaba is a global B2B eCommerce platform. It operates across 200+ countries.
Ans. Building a multi-vendor marketplace similar to Alibaba starts at $1249 one-time. However, the final cost varies depending on your specific requirements.
Ans. AliExpress, 1688.com, Tmall, Juhuasuan, Lazada, and Taobao are popular eCommerce subsidiaries of Alibaba. Other than these, eCommerce platforms Alipay, Alimama, Alitrip, Aliyun and many other Alibaba subsidiaries are also contributing to its growth and expansion.
Ans. Yes, Yo!Kart offers source code ownership, proving you have complete control over the platform.