Track and get real-time status updates for Cainiao shipments.
Cainiao is the logistics arm of Alibaba Group, founded in 2013, and it is the machinery behind most parcels bought on AliExpress, Taobao and Tmall. It is best understood as a network rather than a fleet: Cainiao contracts warehouses, consolidators, airlines and local delivery companies, and coordinates them, which is why a Cainiao number can describe a journey across several companies without ever naming a van you would recognise.
Cainiao has worked with AliExpress since 2014 and describes itself as the world's largest cross-border e-commerce logistics network, handling over 1.5 billion cross-border parcels in its 2023 financial year. A typical order is collected from the seller in China, consolidated at an export hub, flown to the destination region, cleared through import customs and then handed to a delivery company inside your country for the final leg.
That last handover is the moment most people come looking for help. The Cainiao number keeps collecting scans through the international part of the trip, and once a national postal operator or a local courier takes over, the useful detail often moves to a second number issued by that company. Neither number is wrong; they cover different halves of the same journey.
Ships for: AliExpress, Taobao and Tmall sellers shipping cross-border, Merchants using AliExpress Standard Shipping and Cainiao's premium, standard and economy lanes, Marketplaces routing parcels through Cainiao export hubs and overseas warehouses
Typical delivery time: Cainiao publishes three cross-border tiers: roughly 5–10 days on premium lanes to high-demand countries, 10–18 days on standard services and 20–45 days on the cheapest economy options. On parcels tracked with 24hTrack the median ran to 7.2 days from the first scan to delivery, with 80% arriving within 12.1 days and about 18 scans recorded along the way — many more events than a domestic parcel, because each handover adds its own.
Based on delivered packages tracked on the 24hTrack platform, Cainiao shipments take a median of 7.2 days from first carrier scan to delivery — 80% arrive within 12.1 days. See full carrier statistics →
Knowing where your parcel is makes it easier to plan the day you collect it. With 24hTrack you don't need an account on Cainiao's website. Paste the tracking number in the box above and we work out which carrier it belongs to and show you every scan Cainiao has published, on one page.
Official carrier website: track.cainiao.com/orderTrack
There is no single Cainiao format, and that is the accurate answer. Because Cainiao is a platform that routes parcels through many partners, the numbers it issues follow several schemes — common starts include CNG, AP, LP and ZB, with lengths between about thirteen and seventeen characters — and none of them accounts for even a third of the Cainiao numbers seen on the 24hTrack platform. Paste the number exactly as the marketplace shows it and the carrier is detected for you.
No. AliExpress is the shop; Cainiao is the logistics network inside the same group that moves what the shop sells. You buy from a seller on AliExpress, and the parcel travels on Cainiao infrastructure — often under the AliExpress Standard Shipping label, which is the marketplace's own end-to-end service operated with Cainiao. Both names can appear on the same order.
Almost certainly not. After the export scan a parcel waits for space on a flight, travels as consolidated freight and then queues for import customs, and none of those stages produces a scan. Across parcels that were eventually delivered and tracked on 24hTrack, the longest silent stretch was a median of about four days, and more than a quarter went a whole week with no update before arriving. Watch for a scan naming your own country's carrier: that is the handover, and a new number often appears with it.
Whoever Cainiao contracted for the final leg in your country — frequently the national postal operator, sometimes a private courier. The delivering company is usually named in the last few scans rather than at the start, so the honest answer on day one is that it has not been decided yet in a way you can see. Keep the Cainiao number for the international half and, once a local number appears in your marketplace order page, track that one too.
It depends on the shipping tier the seller paid for. Cainiao's own guidance is roughly 5–10 days for premium lanes, 10–18 days for standard and 20–45 days for economy, measured over the transport itself. Add the days before the seller hands the parcel over and any customs hold on top. On the parcels we see, half arrived within about 7 days of the first scan and 80% within about 12.
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