Since May 2026, Douyin Global, Douyin’s cross-border store platform, asks every brand to prove two things before it sells: the goods are made outside mainland China, and they are sold outside it. Your Douyin Partner can build and file that proof. Only you hold the evidence, so the partner earns its fee in operations from here on.

Douyin cross-border brand verification is the platform’s answer to what Chinese media call 假洋牌, fake foreign brands: products made in China, given an overseas name and sold as imports. The check covers both a merchant’s own brands and the brands it sells under authorization.

For a foreign brand that works through a Douyin Partner (DP), it moves one job across the table. Until May, the brand’s part of an application was the home-market trademark certificate and, for a licensee, an authorization letter. The file now needs factory contracts, export paperwork and proof of shelf sales abroad. Those sit with you.

Every rule and figure below was checked against its source on October 11, 2026.

The rule and its dates

Douyin Global (抖音全球购) opened the change for comment on April 28 and posted it on May 6.

Douyin Global began verifying overseas production and overseas circulation for merchants’ own and authorized brands. The notice ran from May 6 to May 12, 2026, with the rule expected to take effect on May 13. Fake overseas backgrounds, spliced documents and staged videos are banned, and penalties run from restricted trading and delisting to store suspension and removal. Source: Douyin E-commerce (抖音电商), notice revising the Douyin Global admission rules, May 2026. https://school.jinritemai.com/doudian/web/articlev0/aJikTPY3ctGa

Douyin announced the launch on May 26. Existing stores aren’t all checked at once.

Douyin checks merchants in batches. A merchant that receives a notice has 30 natural days to submit the overseas production and circulation proof. Late, incomplete or false files lead to delisting and restricted store functions, up to removal of the store. Source: China News Service (中国新闻网), carried by Sina Finance, May 2026. https://finance.sina.cn/2026-05-26/detail-inhzffsk2883470.d.html

The requirement now sits in the admission rules themselves, clause 4.2.2, in the revision that took effect on July 15, 2026. New stores file the proof with their application. For a store that’s already trading, the clock starts when Douyin’s notice lands, and 30 days goes fast when the factory is on another continent.

What Douyin’s cross-border brand verification asks for

Douyin splits the file in two. Production proof shows a qualified factory abroad makes the goods. Circulation proof shows they sell abroad and entered China lawfully.

Requirement	Evidence Douyin accepts	What fails	Who prepares it	Timing
Factory identity	Registered name and address, plus the factory’s official business registration	Details that differ from the registration	Brand supplies, DP uploads	At application, or within 30 days of a notice
Production license	The local license for that product category, such as GMP	A license whose scope doesn’t cover the goods	Brand, from the factory	Same
Production agreement	Signed directly by the brand (or an affiliate, with proof of ownership) and the factory, naming the brand	A maker on the pack that differs from the agreement	Brand	Same
Origin and photos	Certificate of origin from an official body; real photos of product, pack, brand mark and production details	Spliced or staged images	Brand or DP	Same
Free sale certificate	Issued by an official body in the country of origin, for sale outside mainland China	A certificate from a private body	Brand	Same
Customs declaration	One from the last 90 days, with goods, quantity, origin, destination, date and number, on a sensible route	Older than 90 days; a transit port with no first-leg shipping proof	Brand or its forwarder	Under 90 days old when filed
One proof of sales	Wholesale invoices, or three overseas stores on video and photo with receipts, or a live listing on a known overseas marketplace	Wholesale invoices for health supplements or traditional tonics	Brand; DP can brief the filming	Invoices and receipts under 90 days old

The table follows Douyin’s verification guide, which the admission rules of July 15, 2026 link from clause 4.2.2. Source: Douyin E-commerce (抖音电商), overseas production and circulation verification guide, April 2026. https://school.jinritemai.com/doudian/web/article/aJigvdmNLoZw

Read the last column again. Two rows expire. A declaration dated in mid-October is too old by mid-January.

What counts as overseas sales

Douyin accepts one of three proofs, and each has a trap.

Wholesale invoices are the easiest if a distributor buys from you at home. They must show the brand, quantities, amounts, both parties in full and a date inside the last 90 days. Health supplement and traditional tonic brands can’t use this route at all.

The store route takes the most legwork. You need three different shops. At least one has to be a single unbroken video that walks in from the street, past the shelf and price tag, through the checkout scan and on to the receipt printing. Two more shops need photos of the entrance and the shelf, and every shop needs a real receipt under 90 days old.

Online counts too, if the listing is a main product page on a well-known general or specialist marketplace abroad, in stock, with recent sales and reviews. The rule names marketplaces, so a brand’s own web shop doesn’t fit the wording. A brand that sells nowhere outside China has no route in.

Douyin’s May launch notice also listed warning signs for creators and agencies. One was goods shipped into China’s bonded warehouses through Hong Kong with no complete logistics record. If your stock moves through a regional hub, ask your forwarder for the first-leg paperwork now, before the declaration row turns into a problem.

What your Douyin Partner should and should not do

The file work stays with the DP as a routine job, and it shouldn’t be what you pay a premium for. A good one runs a gap check against the table before Douyin’s notice arrives, keeps a calendar for the two documents that expire, translates what needs translating and briefs the store filming so the video isn’t shot twice.

The DP or the bonded warehouse often doubles as the store’s domestic agent, the mainland company Douyin requires, which shares liability for the store.

A Douyin Global store needs a mainland entity carrying joint liability, the domestic agent, and each own or authorized brand must file proof of overseas production and overseas circulation. Source: Douyin E-commerce (抖音电商), Douyin Global admission rules, July 2026. https://school.jinritemai.com/doudian/web/article/108056

Douyin has put agencies on notice as well.

Douyin asked creators and operating agencies to check a cross-border brand’s qualifications before working with it, and to turn down products with doubtful, contradictory or untraceable papers. Source: China News Service (中国新闻网), carried by Sina Finance, May 2026. https://finance.sina.cn/2026-05-26/detail-inhzffsk2883470.d.html

So a DP that offers to “sort out” a missing factory agreement, or to stage the shop video, is offering to put your store on the removal list.

The cost of getting this wrong lands on the brand.

At our Douyin calculator’s defaults, a cross-border store run by a DP ties up 430,000 RMB before its first order, 405,000 of it refundable. The model’s DP retainer is a fixed 30,000 RMB a month, live products or not. At 2 million RMB of yearly sales, one month offline is about 166,700 RMB of sales that never happen. Source: TheChinaPath calculator data, October 2026. https://www.thechinapath.com/tools/douyin-cost-calculator

You can run those numbers for your own category in the Douyin cost calculator.

If the partner opened the store under its own overseas company, the file still needs your documents, and you bargain from a weaker spot. Our piece on who owns your Tmall store and your Douyin shop covers what to sign before that happens.

Then judge a DP on what happens after the file clears: the live room and the customer service desk. The guide to finding a Douyin Partner lists the questions to ask.

Tmall Global’s parallel rules

Tmall Global, Alibaba’s marketplace for imported goods, asks for much of the same evidence, but through a program brands join.

Tmall Global’s 全球探源计划 (Global Origin Tracing), started in May 2026, asks enrolled brands for proof of origin, free sale or market approval, and visual proof of real overseas circulation: an unbroken video in a large overseas retailer or pharmacy, or sales screenshots from a known overseas marketplace. Supplement factories need GMP, TGA or NSF certification. More than 300 overseas brands have signed up. Source: Global Network (环球网), carried by Tencent News, September 2026. https://news.qq.com/rain/a/20260915A091CT00

The binding rules sit in Tmall Global’s merchant qualification standards, and they hit food hardest.

Since May 27, 2026, every Tmall Global food category, plus infant formula and maternal nutrition, requires a mainland company’s business license, its food business license, its legal representative’s ID and a cross-border food entrusted-operation agreement. Source: Tmall Global (天猫国际), notice on the merchant qualification standards, May 2026. https://rule.tmall.hk/?type=detail&ruleId=20010174&cId=636

That mainland company is often your importer or your partner, so check who signs that agreement and what your contract says when you part ways. One supplement category gets a closer look still.

For NAD+ supplements, Tmall Global’s current standards, in force since September 28, 2026, add the factory’s production license, the brand-factory production contract and proof of home-market sales, which Tmall’s overseas staff check on site. Source: Tmall Global (天猫国际), merchant qualification standards, September 2026. https://rule.tmall.hk/?type=detail&ruleId=11000442&cId=624

On October 11, 2026, Tmall Global’s public rule center carried no store-wide check to match Douyin’s. If you sell on both, build one evidence file and refresh it every quarter.

Frequently asked questions

Does Douyin’s dual verification apply to stores that are already open?

Yes. Douyin checks existing Douyin Global stores in batches and sends each one a notice. From that notice, the merchant has 30 natural days to file the production and circulation proof. Missing the deadline, or filing something false, can get products delisted and, at worst, the store removed.

Can my Douyin Partner supply the documents for me?

It can gather and translate them and handle the upload. It can also brief the overseas store filming. What it can’t do is create them. The factory agreement must be signed directly by your company and the factory, and the free sale certificate comes from an official body at home. A partner that offers to produce those papers is a risk to your store.

My brand sells only online outside China. Can it qualify?

Possibly. Douyin accepts a main product listing on a well-known general or specialist marketplace abroad, if it is in stock and shows recent sales and reviews. You still need the production proof, the free sale certificate and a customs declaration from the last 90 days. A brand with no sales outside China at all can’t pass.

Does Tmall Global ask for the same proof?

Partly. Its Global Origin Tracing program asks enrolled brands for very similar evidence, including shop videos. Its binding rules add a mainland licensed company and an entrusted-operation agreement for every food category since May 27, 2026, and factory and sales proof for NAD+ supplements. One file, kept fresh, covers most of both.

Once your evidence file is ready, Compass finds the Douyin Partners that already sell your category.

Get a shortlist of Douyin Partners for your category