On May 22, 2026, the 2026 TikTok Shop Southeast Asia Cross-border E-commerce Annual Summit with the theme of “Acceleration to New Heights” concluded successfully in Guangzhou.
The summit brought together the platform’s core team, industry experts and more than 1,300 business representatives from all over the country. The online live broadcast attracted more than 2.5 million merchants to watch simultaneously.
Summit site, TikTok
Xu Mengqi, the general manager of Shop Southeast Asia’s cross-border e-commerce, used platform data to break down the three major growth patterns of cross-border merchants and new opportunities in the Southeast Asian market, and released a major lightweight management strategy plan for cross-border merchants.
In 2025, TikTok Shop’s cross-border e-commerce in Southeast Asia achieved unexpected growth.
GMV increased by 125% year-on-year, and the trend continued to rise throughout the year, with quarterly growth hitting new highs.
The model of content-driven transactions continues to be verified. The GMV of short videos on Double 12 increased by 257%, and the GMV of live broadcasts increased by 104%. The explosive power of content-driven transactions continues to be released.
The core advantage of domestic merchants is no longer to distribute goods at low prices.
Data shows that in the past two years, the unit price of high-quality overseas merchants has increased by 1.2 times, and the ordering cycle of new merchants has been shortened by 15 days.
At present, more than 40% of cross-border merchants in Southeast Asia come from the domestic e-commerce track. With their mature supply chain system and refined operation capabilities, they can fill the gap in local consumption, escape the involution of existing products, and open up new incremental markets.
In 2025, the number of merchants operating in two or more Southeast Asian countries will increase by 70% year-on-year, and the average annual GMV growth rate will reach 109%, far exceeding that of merchants operating in a single market.
At the same time, the platform’s high-quality self-made content and the scale of cooperation with experts continue to double, and multi-market content operation has become a standard strategy for high-end merchants.
Looking forward to 2026, the Southeast Asian cross-border e-commerce market still has huge room for development.
The total market growth is far from peaking. The overall scale of Southeast Asian e-commerce will exceed US$157.6 billion in 2025, but the e-commerce penetration rate is only 11%. Compared with the domestic market, there is still room for more than twice the growth.
At the same time, consumption growth is extending from core cities to new regions. The platform will increase resource investment in these regions this year to help merchants seize first-mover advantages.
Cross-border e-commerce data shows that Southeast Asian consumers are changing from “satisfying basic needs” to “pursuing quality life”, and a large number of category gaps and brand opportunities are waiting for domestic merchants to fill.
According to predictions from industry authorities, the market coverage of content e-commerce in Southeast Asia will reach 85% of the overall e-commerce market in 2026.
Content e-commerce platforms have become the core consumption scenario for Southeast Asian users. The consumption path from “watching videos” to “being planted” to “instant ordering” has become mainstream, and this is what domestic merchants are best at.
In 2026, the three core strategies of the platform will be completely upgraded, focusing on lowering barriers to entry, improving efficiency, and stabilizing operations, making cross-border business more lightweight, standardized, and more certain.
The first is to increase the number of Chinese brands going overseas, so that good products can quickly take root in Southeast Asia.
The platform will continue to increase support for high-quality domestic products and cutting-edge brands, and broaden the growth track for merchants.
The second is to improve the efficiency of global operations and make business operations easier.
In response to the pain points of merchants’ multi-national operations being cumbersome and inefficient, the platform will realize two-way interoperability of pallets and content.
At present, sales evaluation interoperability in multiple countries has been launched, which can directly help improve conversions.
There are also many efficiency-enhancing functions coming soon.
The third is to accelerate the upgrade of platform infrastructure to allow merchants to operate with peace of mind and ensure long-term business stability.
The platform will continue to optimize business rules and create a better operating environment.
At the same time, it iterates the cross-border fulfillment link, improves export tax exemption and tax refund, large-piece direct mail, and border warehouse supporting services, and achieves logistics cost reduction and acceleration.
At the summit, four benchmark brands also shared their actual overseas experience, providing valuable reference and reference for many businesses.
