In 2026, where is the live-streaming e-commerce industry headed in this cutthroat competition?
In an interview video launched in the past two days, 21-year-old diving Olympic champion Zhang Jiaqi directly responded to some questions about her live-streaming e-commerce:
“I was very nervous during my first live stream. I didn't know what to say, but I think we should be more daring to try new things.” She also said that she accepts some criticism from the public, but she also needs to make a living.
Image source: “We're Saved”
Her response reflects the picture of an era. In recent years, from actors, singers, and hosts to entrepreneurs, writers, and now even sports champions, it seems that everyone is inevitably involved in live-streaming e-commerce.
However, if you think about it carefully, in the past few years, live-streaming e-commerce has indeed been a visible and rapid way to accumulate wealth. Top live-streamers can easily achieve billions in single - session sales, and the income of a celebrity from a single live stream may far exceed the salary for a whole movie.
It has created the myth of underdog success and has become the shortest path for all kinds of celebrities to “cash in on their popularity”.
However, as we enter 2026, beneath the surface hustle and bustle of the industry, undercurrents are already surging. The halo of super-top live-streamers is fading, the regulatory framework is becoming increasingly strict, consumers are becoming more rational, and platform rules are being profoundly reconstructed. The golden era when one could “win effortlessly” relying on personal charm and traffic dividends has come to an end, and a more profound and difficult industry transformation is in full swing.
01 The “Watershed” Has Arrived
Now, the development of the live-streaming e-commerce industry seems to have reached a crucial “watershed”.
On the one hand, the personal halo of top live-streamers is fading at an accelerating pace. The vulnerability of the once seemingly unshakable super-top live-streamer system has been fully exposed in a series of public incidents.
During a live stream at the end of last year, Yan Xuejing, a first-class actress and a regular guest on the Spring Festival Gala, calculated the living expenses of her son's family: “He needs to earn at least one or two million a year for the family to function, but he can only earn a few hundred thousand from a single movie.”
Image source: Douyin
These harsh “complaints about being poor” instantly caused an uproar. On January 10th, Yan Xuejing's accounts on multiple short-video platforms were banned from following due to violations of community regulations. The “Tongchu” brand, which had cooperated with her for over a decade, announced the termination of cooperation, changed the product packaging, and planned to pursue economic compensation.
This is just the tip of the iceberg in the industry. Previously, from Li Jiaqi's “Florasis incident” to the false promotion of mooncakes by “Crazy Little Yangge” and the controversy over cassava vermicelli by “Northeast Sister Yu”, the “failures” of top live-streamers have occurred frequently.
To this day, “Crazy Little Yangge” and “Northeast Sister Yu” have not resumed their live streams. Li Jiaqi has significantly reduced the number of his live streams and shifted to behind-the-scenes incubation. Xin Ba has also issued multiple declarations of leaving the internet...
It can be seen that over-relying on a single individual to maintain a huge business ecosystem and consumer trust contains huge systematic risks. Realizing this, the logic of platform traffic distribution has undergone a fundamental change, and “de-topization” and “supporting brand live streams” have become clear trends.
The annual ecological conference of Douyin's daily necessities and household goods industry released a set of data. In 2025, in Douyin's daily necessities and household goods industry, the number of brands starting brand live streams increased by 64% year-on-year, and the average daily number of newly released short videos increased by 22% year-on-year.
Platforms are starting to try to cultivate a decentralized and more resilient “grassland ecosystem” to replace the previous fragile pattern that relied on a few “giant trees”.
On the other hand, the deep rational awakening of consumers is also rewriting the basic operating rules of the market.
The latest report “New Propositions for a Better Life - Insights into Chinese Consumers” released by Accenture shows that the influence of product features, promotion intensity, and marketing novelty on attracting new customers has increased by about 10 percentage points, while the influence of live-streamer recommendations and celebrity endorsements has significantly decreased.
Image source: “New Propositions for a Better Life - Insights into Chinese Consumers” by Accenture
It can be seen that after years of market baptism and even multiple “pitfalls”, some consumers have bid farewell to the early blind pursuit of the “lowest price in the whole network” and the personal charm of live-streamers. The axis of market demand is firmly shifting from the love for “people” to the rational evaluation of the value of “products” and “stores” themselves.
In addition, the continuously tightening regulatory framework has built a rigid institutional barrier for the standardized development of the industry.
Recently, the State Administration for Market Regulation and the Cyberspace Administration of China jointly announced the “Regulatory Measures for Live-Streaming E-commerce”. It focuses on four types of entities: live-streaming e-commerce platform operators, live-streaming room operators, live-streaming marketers, and live-streaming marketer service agencies, clarifies their responsibilities and obligations, draws a red line for their behaviors, and improves the regulatory mechanism.
This increasingly strict regulatory system has substantially increased the compliance costs and professional thresholds of the industry, closed the window of the “wild growth” era, and forced all participants to transform towards professionalism, institutionalization, and transparency.
The dissolution of the top live-streamer myth has educated the market and promoted the rational awakening of consumers; the rational market demand has in turn forced platforms to optimize their ecosystems and called for a fairer institutional environment; and the tightening of regulations has laid the foundation for the standardization and value return of the entire industry.
Together, they are driving live-streaming e-commerce to transform from a “marketing phenomenon chasing traffic” into a “modern retail format that follows the essence of business and serves the rational market”.
02 Opening Up “New Battlefields”
The “acceleration” of the expansion of the live-streaming e-commerce market has quietly shifted gears in the past two years.
Data from the National Bureau of Statistics shows that in the first three quarters of 2025, the total retail sales of consumer goods reached 36.59 trillion yuan. The proportion of national online retail sales in the total retail sales of consumer goods was 30.84%, and the overall e-commerce penetration rate was 25.02%, hitting a new low in the past four years.
The growth rate of live-streaming e-commerce has also gradually declined from an explosive 245.9% to double digits. According to iResearch, from 2024 to 2026, its growth rate will stabilize at around 18%.
Image source: iResearch
With the traffic dividend reaching its peak, the pressure of survival and development is forcing all participants to innovate their business models and explore value growth curves beyond simple product sales. Currently, three clear “evolution paths” have emerged in the industry.
The first path is the in - depth transformation from a “product promotion channel” to a “brand operator”. The most obvious trend is that top agencies are starting to heavily invest in self - owned brands and supply chains.
This is actually easy to understand because self - owned brands have always been the key to increasing a company's gross profit margin. Take Dongfang Zhenxuan as an example. Its financial report shows that in the fiscal year 2025, the proportion of GMV from Dongfang Zhenxuan's self - owned products increased from 40% to 43.8%, and the gross profit margin increased from 25.9% in the fiscal year 2024 to 32% in the fiscal year 2025.
This high - profit “cake” has attracted many players. Qianxun launched “Fengweipai” and “Bai Suzhen at the Foot of Qingcheng Mountain”; Meiyoung, the company behind Li Jiaqi, launched “All Girls”; Sanzhiyang launched the “Xiaoyang Zhenxuan” APP; and Xinxuan also started to layout origin warehouses... More and more agencies are realizing that controlling the supply chain can bring pricing power, ensure product quality control, increase profits, and ultimately transform users' trust in live - streamers into loyalty to brand assets.
The second path is the comprehensive upgrading of content forms from the “sales - pitch style” to the “professional, variety - show style, and immersive”.
Users' excitement threshold for phrases like “OMG, buy it” has significantly increased, and the value of content has been redefined. Thus, “knowledge - based product promotion” is no longer exclusive to Dongfang Zhenxuan; it has become a widely adopted way to build trust.
The Bee Live - streaming Room pioneered the “live - stream + short drama” model, integrating products naturally into the plot, which increased user stickiness and emotional engagement. More and more brands are going to factories and fields, using traceability live - streams to build product transparency and a sense of quality. Good content is changing from a “traffic hook” to the “core engine” for business growth.
The third path is the shift from “fishing in public - domain traffic” to “cultivating fish in private - domain ecosystems”.
In 2024, Yaowang Technology's procurement amount from Douyin reached 3.158 billion yuan, a year - on - year increase of 37.06%, accounting for 68.86% of the annual procurement total. The huge traffic procurement cost has seriously eroded the profit margin, so that the more products they try to sell, the more they may lose.
Facing the pain points of high public - domain traffic costs and unstable conversion rates, more and more agencies are starting to build private - domain traffic pools.
Image source: All Girls Member Service Center
For example, Meiyoung launched the official WeChat mini - program “All Girls Member Service Center”. Users can click on product links to jump to brand official websites or mini - programs to make purchases. Qianxun also quietly launched the “Qianxun Super Member” mini - program, trying to attract users through the “fixed - price” and “time - limited and quantity - limited flash - sale” models.
Through membership privileges, exclusive products, and in - depth interaction, brands aim to establish a more direct, stable, and emotionally sticky long - term relationship with users, completing the transformation from being “tenants” relying on platform traffic to “landlords” operating their own user assets.
These three paths are not isolated from each other; they together outline a three - dimensional picture of in - depth value exploration in live - streaming e - commerce.
Building a brand is to create core value; creating good content is to amplify this value; and operating the private domain is to hold and operate the user relationships brought by this value in the long term.
As the industry bids farewell to the myth of high - speed growth, in - depth cultivation around “value” itself will be the key to success in the next stage.
03 Where Is Live - Streaming E - commerce Heading?
The era of “wild growth” where one could “make money just by jumping in” is over. The competition in the live - streaming e - commerce industry has fully shifted to a battle for the existing market share. Facing this red ocean that requires in - depth cultivation and every inch of land to be fought for, live - streaming e - commerce practitioners in 2026 are naturally looking towards new frontiers with more potential.
First and foremost is AI. In 2026, artificial intelligence has begun to penetrate the entire industry chain, becoming the key to reshaping competitiveness.
At the front - end, AIGC can generate copywriting and scripts in batches, and virtual digital humans can conduct 24/7 live - streams, which not only significantly reduces costs but also creates new content forms and interaction experiences.
In June 2025, Luo Yonghao conducted a live - stream with his digital clone using Baidu's digital human live - streaming technology. The voice, expression, and tone of his digital clone were highly consistent with his own. Eventually, this live - stream achieved an excellent GMV of 55 million yuan in six hours, demonstrating the strong commercial conversion potential of Baidu's digital human live - streaming technology.
In the middle - end, AI algorithms can be used for intelligent product selection, accurate user profiling, and optimization of personalized recommendation strategies to improve traffic conversion efficiency. In the after - sales service, AI customer service can handle a large number of consultations efficiently. Data shows that in the live - streaming room of Jiaogeyou friends, the proportion of digital human live - streaming time accounts for 40%, and the response efficiency of AI intelligent customer service has increased by 200%.
Technology is no longer just a gimmick. AI has become the core tool for the live - streaming e - commerce industry to improve operational efficiency.
In addition to AI, top players have also more or less laid out overseas business. Due to the mature domestic model and significant supply - chain advantages, players are driven to replicate live - streaming e - commerce overseas, but their overseas expansion paths show distinct differences.
Huang, the big apprentice of Crazy Little Yangge, started live - streaming on TikTok, starting from the entertainment live - streaming field. She uses the familiar funny style from the domestic market on TikTok and has squeezed into the top ten popular live - streaming rooms.
Meiyoung, the company behind Li Jiaqi, has chosen the “localized operation” path, mainly signing local influencers. Data from Fastmoss shows that Meiyoung's Indonesian subsidiary, MTYN, has signed 13 influencers, four of whom have more than five million followers, covering multiple mainstream fields such as beauty and IT...