Scheduled releases: a listing that cannot be bought until its hour arrives
A scheduled listing can be seen and even paid for on the agent side before it opens, but the seller sells only from the stated minute.
Scheduled releases and reminder buttons
A scheduled release is a listing that exists before it can be bought. The page shows the item, often the price, and a locked button reading 即将开售 (on sale soon) with the date and minute of the release, 开售时间. Beside it sits a button to set a reminder, 开售提醒 or 提醒我, which notifies the account that pressed it when the sale opens.
At the stated minute the button unlocks and the listing behaves like any other, until stock runs low. For popular releases the first minutes decide most of the stock, which is why release pages draw a crowd of buyers watching the clock.
What a holiday sale rule says about listing times
Platform rules show how firmly these times are set. Taobao's rules for a 2026 holiday sale (holiday sale rules, 17 April 2026) say registered items should go on sale as soon as the event starts, and a seller who wants to set a listing time must have the item live before 22:00 on the opening day. Several event rules from 2024 and 2025 set a similar latest listing time, usually 22:00 on the day sales open.
A shop's own release is less regulated: the seller picks the minute, and nothing stops them moving it. Read the time on the listing on the day, not the one you noted a week earlier, and remember that it is stated in Beijing time.
Submitting a link before the release hour
The archived CNFans home page put ordering in one line, “paste an item link to submit an order”. You can paste a link to a listing that has not opened yet; what the agent can do with it is another matter. Until the release minute the purchaser has nothing to buy, and the agent's copy of the page may show the price without any way to check out.
In practice the order then waits, or is cancelled when the purchaser finds the button locked. Neither is wrong, but you should choose which. Ask before paying whether the agent will hold the order until the release and try at that minute, and what happens if the stock is gone by the time your order comes up.
Reminders belong to the account that pressed them
A reminder is personal. It sends a notification to the phone signed in to the account that pressed it, and nobody else. You can press it on your own account, but that will not make the purchaser at CNFans buy at the minute; the purchaser works from the agent's account and its own queue.
The words around a release are worth knowing, because they appear on the agent's copy of the page too: 即将开售 before the sale, 已开售 once it opens, 已售罄 when stock has gone, and 补货 (restock) if the seller adds more later. Presale, 预售, is a different arrangement in which you pay before the goods are made, and Taobao's shipping rules let some categories set delivery beyond 48 hours that way; it is outside this page.
Release stock and the first hour
Release stock goes in an order nobody publishes. Popular sizes usually leave first, then popular colours, and what remains after the first hour is often the outliers. An agent order that reaches the purchaser hours after release meets that remainder. If the size you need is a common one, expect it to be among the first to go.
Taobao states its own deadlines in Beijing time, UTC+8, and so do sellers. This site does not convert release times for you; the listing's time is China's time, and the purchaser's working day runs on the same clock. A release at 20:00 lands in the evening in China, which matters for how soon an agent order can follow it.
Release details for the order note
For a scheduled item, the order note should say three things: the release time as printed on the listing, whether you want the purchaser to try at that minute if the agent offers it, and what to do if the stock is gone. Add a second-choice option if you have one.
If the agent says it cannot buy at a set minute, take that at face value and decide whether the item is worth it at whatever remains.