Tmall Global rates the partners that run its stores once a year and sorts them into Gold, Silver and Bronze Star. Domestic Tmall certifies five-star and six-star operators on a yearly list. Douyin grades its brand service providers Diamond, Gold or Silver. Each badge shows a partner’s size and standing with the platform. Use it to build a long list.

It won’t tell you whether the partner has ever sold a product like yours.

Platform pages and news reports checked September 24, 2026.

Agency pitches in China tend to put a platform badge up front. A Tmall Partner (TP), the agency that runs a brand’s store on Tmall or Tmall Global (Alibaba’s cross-border marketplace), shows its stars. A Douyin Partner (DP), which runs a brand’s shop and live room on Douyin, ByteDance’s Chinese short-video app, shows a Diamond or a Gold.

The badges are real. The platforms hand them out on their own data, and that data mostly measures how much a partner sells across all its stores. There’s a crowd to sort through, too.

Douyin had more than 1,500 registered e-commerce service providers in 2025, and more than 350 of them held a rating tier. Source: Paidai (派代), on NetEase, January 2026. https://c.m.163.com/news/a/KIM90VO8055684L8.html

And the contract behind the badge is big money.

Default partner fee in year one: 770,000 RMB on Tmall Global (35,000 RMB a month plus 10% of 3.5 million RMB in sales) and 460,000 RMB on Douyin (30,000 RMB a month plus 5% of 2 million RMB in sales). Source: TheChinaPath calculator data, September 2026.

Neither calculator has an input for the partner’s rating. The cost comes from the retainer, the commission and your sales.

Why Tmall and Douyin rate their partners at all

Most foreign brands can’t staff a store in China themselves, so they hire an operator. A badly run store brings the platform complaints and lost sales. So the platforms score the operators and point brands toward the high scorers.

Once an overseas brand decides to open on Tmall Global, the platform recommends partners whose star level matches the brand’s size: three-star partners for mid-size brands, four-star for large brands and five-star for the largest. Source: Tmall Global partner growth page (天猫国际服务商成长), newest bulletin dated Q1 2018, live September 2026. https://www.tmall.hk/wow/import/act/tpgrowth

Douyin scores on five counts, per Paidai’s January 2026 review: business scale, the number of merchants served, shop and live-room operations and use of Douyin’s ad tools. The fifth is capability and compliance. Two of the five are plain size measures.

Tmall Global partner stars: from a 12-point score to Gold Star

Tmall Global built its scheme on a score out of 12. Its partner page tells TPs where to work on it: a store’s daily sales, its shopper service ratings and platform penalty points.

Partners scoring 7 to 8 points out of 12 were rated three stars, 9 to 10 four stars and 11 to 12 five stars. Strong four- and five-star partners are invited each year to Alibaba’s international recruitment events. Source: Tmall Global partner growth page (天猫国际服务商成长), newest bulletin dated Q1 2018, live September 2026. https://www.tmall.hk/wow/import/act/tpgrowth

Those events are where overseas brands meet TPs with the platform’s endorsement on display. Five-star partners were also invited to a roundtable with Tmall Global’s general manager every six months.

Then the rules changed.

From October 18, 2021, Tmall Global rated partners every quarter, with results in early January, April, July and October. Each tier carried a baseline for the combined 12-month sales of every store bound to the partner. Purple Star, the top tier, was chosen twice a year through an in-person pitch. Source: E-Commerce Daily (电商报), October 2021. https://www.dsb.cn/162249.html

That rule assessed a partner only after it had run a Tmall Global store for three months and filed the store relationship with the platform.

It has been rewritten since. The version in force from March 31, 2026, puts a sales floor under each tier.

Tmall Global rates every operating partner that has stores bound to it, in three tiers: Gold, Silver and Bronze Star. A Gold Star needs at least three bound stores and 40 million RMB of confirmed-receipt sales in the year. Silver needs two stores and 15 million RMB, Bronze two stores and 10 million RMB. Below that, no star. Fake orders and promises a partner can’t keep, such as guaranteed sales, cost it points or its rating. Source: Tmall Global service provider market (天猫国际服务市场), 2026 star rating rules (天猫国际2026服务商生态星级考核规则), March 20, 2026. https://globaltp.tmall.com/import_tp/TP/informationDetail?id=815

The first list under the 2026 rules, published April 29, 2026, covers April 2025 to April 2026. Store scale and growth carry 77% of the score, service experience 20% and content and innovation 3%. Source: Tmall Global service provider market (天猫国际服务市场), FY26 annual star list (FY26天猫国际年度星级服务商榜单), April 29, 2026. https://globaltp.tmall.com/import_tp/TP/informationDetail?id=821

Purple Star doesn’t appear in the 2026 rules, and the weighting still leans hard on size. The sales count adds up every store a partner runs, so a TP with ten busy supplement flagships can hold a Gold Star without ever having opened a pet food store. A starred TP has bound its stores to its account with the platform, though. Ask for the list.

Domestic Tmall’s v-partner list

Domestic Tmall, the marketplace for goods already inside China, runs its own certification, Tmall v-partner, published as a yearly list.

Tmall’s 2025 certification list, published December 26, 2024, covers two star levels (six-star and five-star operating service provider), six new industry certifications (sports and outdoor, apparel, FMCG, home living, 3C digital and automotive) and two capability certifications (digital operations and service experience). Source: China Wealth (中国财富网), on Tencent News, December 2024. https://news.qq.com/rain/a/20241227A067I400

The industry badges are the closest any platform comes to saying what a partner knows. They’re wide, though. A beauty brand and a coffee brand would both be looking at the same FMCG badge.

Which list applies depends on the store. Selling cross-border on Tmall Global? Ask about Tmall Global stars. If you or your distributor run a domestic Tmall store, v-partner is the one that counts. Some operators hold both.

Douyin Diamond, Gold and Silver service providers

Douyin calls these agencies e-commerce service providers, and its tiers have moved around.

Douyin’s brand service provider rating ran every six months, with Diamond, Gold, Silver, Bronze and ordinary tiers. The second-half 2023 round named 12 Diamond, 12 Gold and 27 Silver providers. Source: Bianews (鞭牛士), on Tencent News, September 2023. https://news.qq.com/rain/a/20230915A02JQI00

Six months later Douyin cut a tier.

Douyin’s rating mechanism for brand service providers from the second quarter of 2024 dropped Bronze and kept three tiers: Diamond, Gold and Silver. Source: 36Kr (36氪), on Tencent News, March 2024. https://news.qq.com/rain/a/20240318A04T5T00

Paidai’s review says Douyin now rates by the quarter, the half year and the year. And Bronze hasn’t disappeared from every track.

Providers are rated within their track, brand or industry belt, and end up Diamond, Gold, Silver or Bronze. Rated providers get a clearer growth path and first call on platform resources. Source: Adquan (广告门), December 2025. https://www.adquan.com/article/357549

The Bronze example in that piece is an industry-belt provider, the track that serves merchants in China’s manufacturing clusters. A foreign brand hires from the brand track, so a Bronze badge in a pitch to you most likely comes from the other one. Ask which. If the badge is a Diamond, ask which platform resources it would actually bring to your shop.

Tmall and Douyin partner ratings side by side

Platform	Rating scale	How it’s scored, how often	What a top rating gets the partner	What it doesn’t tell you
Tmall Global	Gold, Silver or Bronze Star under the 2026 rules (earlier: a score out of 12, then quarterly tiers with Purple Star on top)	Yearly, April to April; sales and growth of all bound stores 77%, service 20%, content 3%; Gold Star needs three stores and 40 million RMB	A star badge in the list brands use to choose a partner; invitations to run Tmall Global’s own direct-sale projects; a dedicated platform contact	Whether the partner has run your category; who would run your store
Tmall (domestic)	v-partner: five-star and six-star operating service provider, plus six industry and two capability badges	Yearly list, first published December 26, 2024	Platform support, per Tmall’s announcement	Category fit inside broad badges such as FMCG
Douyin	Brand track: Diamond, Gold, Silver (Bronze remains in the wider scheme)	Five dimensions; rated by quarter, half year and year	A clearer growth path and first call on platform resources	Whether its live rooms sell your kind of product; sales after returns

How to check a partner’s rating yourself

A rating on a slide is a claim. Here’s how to test it.

Ask which round. Tmall Global now rates once a year, April to April, and Douyin rates by quarter, half year and year. A Diamond from 2023 tells you where the partner stood in 2023.

Ask for the platform’s own notice. That means a screenshot of the announcement or of the partner backend, with the date showing.

Match the company name. The rating belongs to the company certified with the platform. Check it against the one that will sign your contract. Agency groups sometimes pitch under one name and sign under another.

Check the Douyin service market. Douyin’s service market for shops (抖店服务市场) has a provider lookup behind a login. It also posts notices naming operating providers that broke its rules, in numbered batches. On September 24, 2026, the latest was batch 2026.3.

Ask for the bound stores. A starred TP has bound its stores to its account with Tmall Global, so it can name them. Ask for the ones in your category, then open them the way a shopper would.

That last check does most of the work. Our guides on how to find a Tmall Partner and how to find a Douyin Partner cover the rest, from the named team to the exit terms. Compass files partners by the categories we’ve watched them run, with the star as a footnote. To measure a quote, run the Tmall Global calculator or the Douyin cost calculator.

Questions brands ask about partner ratings

Is a five-star Tmall Partner better than a four-star one?

It’s bigger by the platform’s own measures. Tmall Global’s tiers rest on combined sales across all of a partner’s stores, so a higher star tells you about volume and standing. A smaller partner running six stores in your category can still be the stronger pick.

What is a Diamond service provider on Douyin?

Diamond is the top tier Douyin gives its e-commerce service providers. A Diamond provider is large and in good standing with Douyin. Watch two evenings of its live rooms before you decide whether it can sell your product.

Should I only meet top-rated partners?

The top tiers are small and full of large operators. Use the ratings to build a long list, then cut it on category experience, the named team and the stores you can open yourself. An unrated specialist with the right stores can beat a Diamond with none in your category.

Get a Compass shortlist of partners already running stores in your category