Singles’ Day 11.11: the US deals worth buying today

Amazon Haul’s 11-cent deals disappear at the end of today. Origins’ 25% sitewide sale ends at 11:59 p.m. Eastern. AliExpress, which built its whole November around the date, keeps its 11.11 festival running until November 18. Same date on every email, and the deadlines don’t match.

That’s how Singles’ Day works in the US. The holiday started in China as a day for single people (the date looks like four people standing alone), and Alibaba turned it into an online sale that has long since outgrown a single day. Here it’s a looser thing: overseas marketplaces promote it heavily, beauty brands have adopted it, and a few big US retailers use the date as a hook for their first holiday markdowns. This year November 11 is also Veterans Day, so your inbox is mixing two different kinds of sales.

The filter I use is simple: would this offer still look good next to what the same store will charge on Black Friday, November 27. Below is what was actually running today and how I’d judge each one.

What’s live today

These are the offers I could confirm from the brands’ own announcements or from published deal coverage this week. Where a store didn’t post an end time, I’ve said so instead of guessing.

There’s more out there. Groupon is advertising up to 75% off spa and beauty experiences, Quay has 40% off sitewide, ALO has 30% off for members of its ALO Access program, and DHgate is running its own 11.11 sale with up to 70% off. The table covers the ones with the clearest terms.

Beauty is where 11.11 pays off

If you only act on one category today, make it beauty. The reason is boring: these are percentage discounts on a full catalog, usually paired with a gift, on products people reorder anyway. A sitewide cut from the brand itself is also easy to judge, because you probably already know what your moisturizer or foundation costs and how often it goes on sale.

The gift is where people overspend. Estée Lauder’s ELEVEN26 code takes 20% off, with a six-piece gift at $75 and a full-size Perfectionist Pro serum added at $140. Origins asks for $100 to get its six-piece gift. Before you build a cart to hit a threshold, check one detail in the offer terms: whether the minimum is counted before or after the discount.

Here’s why that matters, with round numbers. Say your cart is $80 at full price. With 20% off you pay $64. If the $75 threshold is measured on the discounted total, you’re $11 short and the site will nudge you to add something. If you add a $15 item you’d never have bought, the “free” gift just cost you $15. That’s only a good trade if the gift contains things you’d actually use, so open the gift details and read the sizes. Deluxe samples and travel minis add up to a nice number on paper and a small amount of product in your bathroom.

Fenty’s $11 items are the easiest call of the day. A fixed low price on specific products (setting powders, primers, serums and curl creams were among the examples in WWD’s roundup) needs no math. If something you already use is on the list, buy it. If nothing is, skip it. An $11 foundation in a shade you’ve never worn is still $11 spent on a guess.

AliExpress and the overseas sites

AliExpress said in its own announcement that the US festival runs November 1 through November 18, so nothing there truly ends tonight, whatever the countdown banners say. Its terms also say the coupons are first come, first served, apply only to eligible items and come with exclusions. That’s normal for marketplace coupons: they’re tiered by minimum spend, and the bigger tiers tend to go first.

Three checks matter more than the coupon tier:

1. Import charges. The US stopped letting low-value overseas packages in duty-free last year: China and Hong Kong lost the exemption in May 2025, and every other country followed on August 29, 2025. CBP made the suspension indefinite in rules published in the Federal Register in June. Look at the final checkout screen for import charges before comparing prices with a US store.
2. The return route. AliExpress says Choice items and eligible items from its Brand+ section ship free and return free. Other listings follow the seller’s own terms, and a return across an ocean can cost more than a cheap item is worth. Read the return line on the listing itself.
3. The delivery date. AliExpress offers a delivery guarantee with refunds or coupons for eligible late orders. A coupon is no help if a gift shows up December 28. If you’re buying for Christmas, use the estimated date at checkout and only count on it if there’s a comfortable cushion.

On “up to 90% off,” treat the crossed-out price as the seller’s opinion. The better test is to search the exact model number on Amazon or Walmart.com and see what the same item costs from a US seller once you add shipping. Generic phone cases, cables, craft supplies and small tools are the categories where I’d expect the overseas price to hold up. Branded electronics are where I’d expect it to shrink once you compare.

Amazon Haul’s 11-cent items

Amazon doesn’t run an official Singles’ Day sale in the US, but Haul, its low-price storefront, timed its early holiday event to the date: $0.11 deals on November 10 and 11 and $1 flash deals through Saturday, November 14. The catch is the cart rules. Delivery is free at $25, the discounts step up to 5% off over $50 and 10% off over $75, and free returns cover eligible items over $3 within 15 days of delivery. A $1 or 11-cent item sits below that return line.

That makes Haul a decent place for stocking stuffers you were going to buy anyway, as long as you fill the $25 with things on your list. It’s a bad place to experiment. If you add a dozen $1 items to reach free delivery, assume none of them are coming back.

The “up to 70%” sales

Macy’s, Wayfair and Groupon all advertised discounts topping out at 70% or 75%. “Up to” is a ceiling, and the ceiling usually applies to a handful of items you weren’t looking for. The number that matters is the discount on the specific thing you want, compared with the price that item sold for in October.

At department stores that run some kind of sale most weeks, I judge a deal against the last sale price, not against “original.” For Wayfair’s 24-hour flash deals, read the return section before you buy anything large. On a non-defective return of bulky furniture, the return shipping typically comes out of your refund, and on a sofa or bed frame that can erase the flash discount. Groupon spa deals are fine if you check that the business has open appointments before you pay, since a cheap voucher you can’t book isn’t cheap.

If you served, check the other sale first

Because today is Veterans Day, many stores are running military discounts alongside their 11.11 offers. Some apply online through an ID verification step, others only in store. Store codes and military discounts don’t always combine, so if you qualify for both, try each at checkout and keep the bigger one.

What can wait until Black Friday

Anything with a plug. TVs, headphones, laptops and smart home gear are where Black Friday week does its heaviest discounting, and Amazon already has early Black Friday deals running. Buying a gadget today because of an 11.11 banner usually means paying more than you’d pay in two weeks. Same goes for big furniture outside a flash sale and for any overseas order you’d need before December 25 but can’t confirm will arrive in time.

What’s worth doing tonight is short: replenish the beauty and skincare you already use while the sitewide codes run, pick up Haul stocking stuffers only if they’re on your list, and leave everything else in your cart. The AliExpress sale will still be there tomorrow, and so will most of these prices on November 27.