Chinese Singles' Day, or Bachelors' Day, originated at Nanjing University in 1993. Singles' Day celebrations spread to several other universities in Nanjing during the 1990s.
The date, November 11th (11/11), was chosen because the number '1' resembles an individual who is alone.The holiday has also become a popular date to celebrate relationships.Over 4,000 couples married in Beijing on this date in 2011, compared to an average of 700 a day.The holiday has become the largest offline and online shopping day in the world, with Alibaba shoppers exceeding 168.2 billion yuan in spending during the 2017 celebration.Rival JD.com hosts an eleven-day shopping festival as well, which garnered US$19.1 billion, bringing the Chinese total to US$44.5 billion.