Chinese express delivery firms handled 5.26 billion packages during the "Singles Day" week, one of the biggest online shopping events in the world.

State media reported that the shipment volume from the Double 11 online shopping festival surged 23.22% from the previous year, citing data from China's State Post Bureau for the first 11 days of November.

"China's consumer market has progressed steadily along the post-COVID recovery path. Consumption has become an increasingly important engine of China's economy, which contributed 83.2% to the GDP growth in the first three quarters of the year, compared with 77.2% in the first half of the year," Xinhua said.

On November 11 alone, a total of 639 million express parcels were collected, which was 1.87 times the "normal" daily business volume and represented a year-on-year increase of 15.76%, the report added.

Xinhua noted that Alibaba's Taobao and Tmall Group said it had recorded year-on-year growth in Gross Merchandise Value (GMV) — the number of orders and participating merchants — during its "Double 11" sale period from October 24 to November 11.

It said a total of 402 brands reached over 100 million yuan (about US$13.93 million) each in GMV, while 38,000 brands saw a more than 100% growth from the same period of 2022 as of 12:00 a.m., according to Alibaba.

Another e-commerce giant, JD.com, said that its transaction volume, order volume and user engagement reached "all-time highs," noting that over 60 brands surpassed 1 billion yuan each in transaction volume and nearly 20,000 brands achieved a threefold transaction volume increase from the previous year.