Explore the OOTDBuy Spreadsheet

It is something you walk along and pick from, one entry at a time, with every entry pointing at a seller who has never heard of the list.

Who built the shelf matters as much as what is on it. So does what happens after you take something off it.

Aisles

Find a category that fits

These are the categories most lists are built out of. The note under each one is the thing to settle before that category becomes an order, because every one of them has a way of going wrong that photographs will not warn you about.

A single white low-top sneaker photographed from the side on a plain background, with the words For Walking hand-lettered across the panel

SneakersPhotographs never settle sizing. Get the insole length in centimetres first.

A navy and slate blue hooded shell jacket hanging zipped shut in front of a window blind

Jackets & CoatsShell, down or fleece moves the shipping weight far more than the size does.

A complete grey pullover hoodie with a kangaroo pocket, laid flat against a pale textured background

HoodiesThin cotton and heavy cotton photograph identically. The stated weight is the tell.

A plain black short-sleeved tee laid flat, with a small yellow smiley and the word Good printed at chest height

T-ShirtsThe easiest thing to add to a batch, and the easiest to forget you added.

Light-wash jeans laid flat with distressing at the knee and red embroidery running down the thigh

JeansSellers measure flat, so a waist and an inseam are two numbers, never one.

Three pairs of fleece joggers side by side, two in cream and one in black, each with a drawstring waist

SweatpantsSold in packs as often as singly. Check whether the link means one pair or three.

A model sitting on a rug in a blue striped shirt under a white cable knit sweater vest, with white socks and trainers

WomenswearMost lists carry no menu of its own for it, so it arrives as a search, not an aisle.

A blue basketball jersey numbered 30 fitted on a black mannequin torso against a grey wall

JerseysTeam, season and player sit in one line of the title. Read that line twice.

A grey monogrammed crossbody bag held up inside a car, above the centre console and gear selector

BagsHardware and lining are where two listings of the same bag stop matching.

A pale yellow cap with a white embroidered flower at the front, photographed against a printed blue card

HatsOne size fits most is a claim, not a measurement. Look for a circumference.

A taupe leather belt with a wide silver buckle, held in a white-gloved hand beside its orange box

BeltsBelt sizes are quoted as total strap length, which is not your waist size.

Black square sunglasses with gold hinges lying on a red velvet tray next to a pale blue presentation box

EyewearThe case takes up more room in the carton than the glasses inside it do.

A navy and gold gift box holding four miniature fragrance bottles, with two small ornaments standing beside it

PerfumeLiquids are a limited category rather than a free one. The operator asks you to check first.

A pearl necklace laid out in a full circle, with a small silver pendant and a tag hanging at the clasp

JewellerySmall, light, added late. Also the first thing to lose track of once a batch grows.

A smartwatch with a taupe woven loop strap, the lit face reading ten past ten

WatchesThe case size in the title is not the strap size. They are separate measurements.

A black portable speaker standing on green turf in front of a shelf of shoe boxes and small collectible figures

ElectronicsMagnetic components sit on the restricted list, so read it before this kind of link goes in.

The shelf

A shelf you walk along, and a box that walks it for you

Each entry on a spreadsheet of finds is one item on one Chinese marketplace, with a note attached by whoever added it. There is nothing to open and nothing to download. You browse it the way you browse any shop: by category, or by typing what you are after.

Typing is the faster half. The operator's own box answers before you have finished the word, and it reads Taobao, Weidian and 1688 behind the scenes, so one query covers three marketplaces that have no search in common.

What a shelf cannot tell you is why an entry is on it. That judgement stays with you, and it is the part that decides whether the order was worth placing. How to weigh up a find, a seller and an agent is a page of its own.

A close-up of a rounded search box with the word Product at the left, the letters h o typed in the middle, four small grey platform badges and a camera icon towards the right, a round orange magnifier button on the end, and three shortcut pills reading Hoodie, T-shirt and Jacket underneath — The operator's search box part-way through a query. The shortcut pills under the box are standing links rather than live results: only the first of them matches the letters that have been typed.View full-size screenshot

Seven jobs, and who ends up holding each one

The confusion that costs people money is almost always about which of these belongs to whom. The list keeper chose. The operator bought and shipped. The seller made and packed. You carried the judgement the whole way.

The job	Who does it	When it happens
Deciding what is worth buying	You, helped by whoever keeps the list	Before anything is paid for
Reading the seller listing properly	You, on the seller page itself	Before the link is submitted
Placing the order with the seller	An OOTDBuy buyer, on your behalf	After the first payment clears
Checking, weighing and photographing	The OOTDBuy warehouse	On arrival, before storage
Choosing what actually leaves China	You select it, the operator screens it	At parcel submission
Carrying the parcel abroad	A courier, resold to you by the operator	After the second payment
Answering for a parcel that arrives damaged	You first, with evidence, then the operator	Inside a fixed window after delivery

This site holds none of these jobs. It is a guide. It never takes a payment, never handles a parcel, and cannot look anything up in your account. Who writes it and how it pays for itself.

A link is not the only way in

Two more doors sit on the operator's own front page, and both of them matter when a list lets you down. The custom order route is for an item you can describe but cannot point at: you fill in the details and a buyer goes looking. The forwarding route is for goods that are already on their way to the warehouse, bought by you somewhere else entirely.

The second one is worth knowing about before you need it. It is the difference between a purchase made on a Chinese site without an agent being a mistake and it being a parcel with somewhere to land.

Two white cards side by side, one headed Custom Order with the line Cannot find the item, fill in the details to order and a line-drawn clipboard icon, the other headed Forwarding Order about managing packages sent to the warehouse and shipped abroad, with a document-and-tick icon, each card carrying an orange Explore Now button — Two service cards from the front of the operator site. Neither of them starts with a link from a list: one starts with a description, the other with a parcel that is already moving.View full-size screenshot

What people get wrong about the lists themselves

More of them, with the vocabulary you will meet on the operator's screens, are on the questions page.

Is a spreadsheet of finds an official OOTDBuy product?

No. The lists are made by shoppers and by communities. The operator supplies the buying, the warehouse and the shipping, not the choosing. That is why two lists can point at the same seller and disagree completely about whether the item is any good.

Why do the same items keep turning up on every list?

Because lists are copied more often than they are built. A link that has been forwarded a dozen times arrives with none of the reasoning that put it on the first list, and usually with none of the sizing notes either. Judging a find on its own merits is a separate skill from collecting one.

What makes a useful spreadsheet, and how do I spot one?

Four things, none of which is how it looks. Whether the links still resolve today, which you can test in a minute by opening three at random. Whether it says when it was last checked, rather than implying it is current. Whether it says who keeps it and how it is paid for. And whether the notes beside each find say anything specific, such as a measurement or a sizing warning, instead of adjectives. A list that claims stock, a delivery time or a price is claiming to know things only the operator can know, and that is the clearest signal of all. Apply the same four to this site.

What do I do when a link on a list is dead?

Seller listings come down, and popular ones come down fastest. Search the item by name instead of by address, or describe it through the custom order route above. A dead link is not a dead item.