CNY ecommerce planning: the 2027 cut-off calendar

Chinese New Year 2027 runs from Friday, February 5 to Saturday, February 13. Good CNY ecommerce planning counts backward from that eve: stock landed in the bonded warehouse by January 22, outbound and courier cover agreed by January 31, holiday staff rotas signed and festival media booked before the platforms open their January sales.

Updated November 2026 for the 2027 holiday. This page is revised every year when the State Council publishes the next calendar.

Shoppers keep buying through the holiday. What stops is everything behind the store page, from warehouse crews to the people who approve your ads, and each part stops on a different day. The calendar below puts the four workstreams on one page.

What closes for Chinese New Year 2027, and for how long

The official calendar is short and fixed. The State Council General Office published it on November 5.

The 2027 Spring Festival holiday runs from February 5 (New Year’s Eve, a Friday) to February 13, nine days, with Sunday January 31 and Sunday February 14 as working days. Source: General Office of the State Council (国务院办公厅), Guobanfamingdian [2026] No. 10, November 2026. https://www.gov.cn/zhengce/content/202611/content_7085101.htm

Those two Sundays are the part people get wrong. A Chinese team works straight through from Sunday, January 31 to Thursday, February 4, then six days in a row from Sunday, February 14 to Friday, February 19. Your partner’s office will be open on both Sundays. Your team back home won’t be.

Nine days off on paper runs longer in practice. Best Express, a national courier, closed from February 11 to 23 in 2026, five days before the eve. The State Post Bureau’s own planning starts two weeks out.

The 2026 Spring Festival travel season for parcel services ran 40 days, from February 2 to March 13, and couriers had to publish their holiday operating plans in advance. Source: State Post Bureau (国家邮政局) plan, via Sina Finance, January 2026. https://finance.sina.com.cn/wm/2026-01-26/doc-inhirqay6342540.shtml

The 2026 eve fell on February 16, so that window opened 14 days ahead of it. Carry the same spacing onto 2027 and the slowdown starts around January 22. The Ministry of Transport has not yet set the 2027 dates.

The 2027 cut-off calendar, four workstreams

Read the dates two ways. The holiday days, the swapped working Sundays and the statutory pay days are fixed by the State Council and the holiday regulations. The platform and courier dates are not published yet for 2027: they repeat the spacing each platform used around the 2026 eve, and they move when the platforms announce, usually in January.

The same calendar, one checkbox per line with an owner column, is in the printable CNY cut-off calendar.

Stock: the last replenishment that lands in time

Start at the warehouse and work backward. A unit only sells if it’s through customs, put away and showing as available. For a bonded store on Tmall Global or JD Worldwide that means the last container has to arrive with enough slack for clearance and receiving before the crews thin out.

Our rule for the calendar: treat January 22 as the last put-away day. That is 14 days before the eve, the point at which last year’s parcel season started. Anything later lands in the busiest week of the parcel season, when the crews you need for receiving are packing outbound orders.

Then buy cover. The arithmetic favors holding a little more than you think.

An extra month of stock in a bonded warehouse costs 0.8 RMB a unit, and a returned parcel costs 30 RMB (pick and pack 4, last mile 11, return handling 15). TheChinaPath calculator data, November 2026.

So 10,000 extra units held through February cost about 8,000 RMB in storage. A stock-out costs the sale, the ranking and the ad money that brought the shopper to an empty listing.

Customs kept working, at least at the big ports. In 2026 several offices ran clearance through the break.

Shanghai Pudong Airport Customs accepted declarations every day of the 2026 holiday and ran a priority window for express and perishable cargo. Source: Shanghai Cross-border E-commerce Association (上海跨境电子商务行业协会), reposting the Pudong Airport Customs notice, February 2026. https://www.scea.co/trends/show/id/3866.html

The hold-up is people. The warehouse can receive, but only with a crew.

Logistics: bonded, direct mail and domestic courier stop on different days

Bonded orders ship from a warehouse inside China, so they depend on the warehouse rota and the domestic courier. Direct mail adds the international leg and a customs desk at the post office. Stock held by a distributor depends on when the distributor’s own warehouse closes. Each slows on its own schedule.

The couriers say they stay open. They also charge more and run slower.

SF Express and JD Logistics added peak “resource adjustment” surcharges on heavy freight from January 19, 2026, of 0.1 to 1.5 RMB a kilo (SF) and 0.1 to 1.2 RMB a kilo (JD), with JD’s running to February 23. Source: China Communications and Transportation Association, Smart Logistics branch (中交协智慧物流分会), January 2026. http://www.wlxh.org/cn/menu_70/2121.htm

Over the 2026 holiday Yunda warned of delays of two to three days within a province and four to five days between provinces, Best Express closed from February 11 to 23, and ZTO returned to normal operations on February 22, the sixth day of the new year. Source: Guangming Online (光明网), reprinting Ningbo Fabu (宁波发布), February 2026. https://m.gmw.cn/2026-02/08/content_1304336193.htm

The post office said the same in plainer words.

The State Post Bureau warned that holiday delivery times could slip and shipping charges could be adjusted, as daily volume ran near 670 million parcels in the week of February 2 to 8, 2026. Source: People’s Daily (人民日报), February 2026. https://cpc.people.com.cn/n1/2026/0212/c64387-40664554.html

The platforms adjust too, and they do it differently. Tmall runs an opt-in campaign for stores that keep shipping.

Tmall’s 2026 no-closing campaign ran from February 12 to 23. Enrolled stores had to ship within 48 hours, and Tmall Global bonded import orders within 72 hours of payment. Source: Ebrun (亿邦动力), via Sina Tech, January 2026. https://finance.sina.com.cn/tech/roll/2026-01-30/doc-inhkauvi0522232.shtml

Douyin does the opposite and relaxes the clock for everyone.

Douyin automatically extended the ship-by date to February 27, 2026 for orders paid from February 11 to 24, and restored normal rules for orders paid from February 25. Merchants could switch the extension off. Source: Xianning News, republishing the Douyin merchant notice, via People’s Political Consultative Conference Net (人民政协网), January 2026. https://www.rmzxw.com.cn/c/2026-01-30/3862136.shtml

Decide in January which you are. Enrolling in Tmall’s campaign means a warehouse crew and a courier pickup on the days your competitors are off. Staying out means your listings show a longer delivery promise.

Staffing: who answers a customer at 11pm on day three

Somebody has to. Shoppers keep spending through the holiday.

Daily sales at key retail and catering companies rose 5.7% over the 2026 Spring Festival holiday compared with 2025. Source: Ministry of Commerce (商务部) press conference, February 2026. https://www.mofcom.gov.cn/xwfbzt/2026/swbzklxxwfbh2026n2y26r/index.html

Chinese law prices that cover. Since 2025 the Spring Festival carries four statutory days, and any work on them costs triple.

Spring Festival is a four-day statutory holiday covering New Year’s Eve and the first three days of the new year. Source: State Council (国务院), Decree No. 795, November 2024. https://www.gov.cn/zhengce/zhengceku/202411/content_6986381.htm

Employers pay at least 300% of wages for work on a statutory holiday, and 200% for work on a rest day when no time off in lieu is given. Source: Labor Law of the PRC, Article 44, as amended December 2018, via the Guangdong Provincial Government (广东省人民政府). https://www.gd.gov.cn/zwgk/wjk/zcfgk/content/post_2532147.html

In 2027 the four statutory days are February 5 to 8. February 9 to 13 are swapped rest days. That split matters when your partner sends the overtime invoice, so agree the rates in January.

Then name people. A rota that says “customer service team” leaves the third night empty. Write one name per day, the hours, the backup and the one decision each person can take alone (a refund, a replacement, a delay message). Your Tmall Partner or agency should hand you this in writing before January 22. Ask for it early, because their own staff are booking train tickets home at the same time.

Media: why the approval queue moves before the holiday

Most of the festival sale happens before the holiday. In 2026 the platforms opened early and ran long.

Tmall’s 2026 New Year goods festival sold from January 4 to February 11, 41 days, against 19 days the year before. Source: Ebrun (亿邦动力), via Sina Finance, December 2025. https://finance.sina.com.cn/tech/roll/2025-12-26/doc-inhecfii8088058.shtml

Douyin’s 2026 New Year goods festival ran 26 days, from January 16 to February 10. Source: Ebrun (亿邦动力), January 2026. https://m.ebrun.com/ebrungo/zb/636766.html

JD ran longest.

JD’s 2026 New Year goods festival ran 32 days, from January 25 to February 23, built around keeping logistics running over the holiday. Source: Chao News (潮新闻), Zhejiang Daily Group, February 2026. https://tidenews.com.cn/news.html?id=3366295

More than 130 JD Logistics overseas, bonded and direct-mail warehouses kept operating through the 2026 holiday. Source: Sina Finance (新浪财经), January 2026. https://finance.sina.com.cn/wm/2026-01-30/doc-inhiznzt7182888.shtml

So registration sets the media deadline. Festival slots, platform coupons and creative all need sign-off from the platform and your agency before the sale opens. At the 2026 spacing, Tmall’s sale would open around December 24 and Douyin’s around January 5. Book in December. A plan approved on January 20 buys the tail end of the sale and a holiday with no one at a desk to change it.

Set the daily caps before the eve. Most of the agency team that watches your spend on a normal Tuesday will be home from February 5.

The first week back, which is where the damage usually shows

The holiday ends on Saturday, February 13, and the backlog lands the next day, which is a working Sunday.

After the 2026 holiday, daily courier volume returned to normal quickly and peaked above 700 million parcels a day. Source: CCTV (央视网), citing the State Post Bureau, March 2026. https://news.cctv.com/2026/03/09/ARTIvDJ9DPc1s2zBjD41o9Ug260309.shtml

Orders taken over the holiday ship late, and shoppers write in to ask where they are. At the 2026 spacing, Douyin’s deadline for those orders falls around February 16. Stock counts drift too, because returns and damaged units came back while the warehouse ran on a skeleton crew.

Run the stock count on February 14, the working Sunday. Order the first replenishment by February 16, since the overseas leg needs weeks. Keep paid media on in-stock SKUs until the count is clean, and plan March on real numbers. Put this week on the rota too, with its own owners.

If you run a bonded store, check your Tmall Global setup and run calculator inputs for storage and returns against what the holiday cost you. Our campaigns team plans festival media, and the cross-border ecommerce team runs bonded stores through the break.

FAQ

When is Chinese New Year 2027?

New Year’s Day falls on Saturday, February 6, 2027. The official holiday runs nine days, from New Year’s Eve on Friday, February 5 to Saturday, February 13. Sunday, January 31 and Sunday, February 14 are working days under the State Council notice of November 5, 2026. Plan around the eve, since couriers and warehouse crews leave before it.

What is the last day to ship bonded stock into China before the holiday?

There is no single official date. Customs offices kept clearing through the 2026 holiday, so the limit is the warehouse crew. Our calendar uses January 22, 2027, two weeks before the eve, as the last put-away day. Confirm your own warehouse’s last receiving day in writing in December.

Do I have to pay staff extra over Chinese New Year?

In China, yes. Work on February 5 to 8, 2027, the four statutory days, is paid at least 300% of wages. Work on February 9 to 13, the swapped rest days, is paid 200% unless time off is given later. If your partner staffs your store, ask how they bill those days before you sign the rota.

Download the cut-off calendar and check it against your own stock plan