On 1 August 2022, exactly four years ago today, I published an article listing 6 reasons you shouldn’t shop at SHEIN. It quickly became my most-read article and, judging by the many comments and messages I’ve received since then, it’s a topic that still sparks a lot of discussion. In those four years, SHEIN has continued to grow into one of the world’s largest fashion retailers. At the same time, the company has faced increasing scrutiny from journalists, researchers, governments and NGOs over its environmental impact, labour practices, business model and transparency. So now I’m starting this post with a simple question: has anything changed after four years?
If you haven’t read the original post yet, I’d recommend starting there first. It provides some background on SHEIN and explains the six reasons in more detail. You can read it here (opens in new tab).
Why I’m revisiting this article
Whenever I write an article, I’m aware that it won’t stay up to date forever. Companies change, new research is published, investigations uncover new information, and sometimes criticism is no longer justified. If I’m going to encourage people to make informed decisions, I think it’s important to revisit older articles every now and then to see whether they still reflect the current situation.
Over the past few weeks, I’ve gone back through my original blog post about SHEIN and compared it with recent investigations, sustainability reports, academic research and news coverage. I wanted to find out whether the concerns I wrote about four years ago still hold up today, whether SHEIN has made meaningful improvements, or whether some issues have actually become worse.
Below, I’ll discuss each of the six reasons from my original article and look at what has changed, and what hasn’t.
#1. They still use harmful materials: synthetics & chemicals
Unfortunately, not much has changed since I wrote about SHEIN’s materials in the first article. According to a 2025 Greenpeace investigation, 82% of SHEIN’s fibres are still polyester. In other words, the vast majority of their clothing is still made from fossil-fuel-based synthetic materials. That means all the environmental problems I mentioned four years ago are still very much relevant. Polyester production continues to rely on crude oil, sheds microplastics every time it is washed, and contributes to climate change. Greenpeace points out that synthetic fibres are cheaper and faster to process than natural alternatives, making them a perfect fit for SHEIN’s ultra-fast fashion business model [1].
What has become even more concerning is what Greenpeace found when it tested 56 SHEIN products from eight countries. Nearly one in three products contained hazardous chemicals above EU legal limits, including phthalates, PFAS (“forever chemicals”), formaldehyde and heavy metals. Some waterproof jackets contained PFAS levels more than 3,000 times above the legal limit. These substances have been linked to hormone disruption, fertility problems, child development issues and environmental pollution. SHEIN says it has strengthened its chemical management in recent years, but Greenpeace concluded that there is “no sign of any real progress”. So, the materials themselves haven’t become any more sustainable, and concerns about the chemicals used in those materials are still far from resolved [1].
#2. Their prices are rising, but for the wrong reasons
SHEIN’s biggest selling point is still its incredibly low prices. In my previous post, I discussed some reasons for how they manage to do that: cheap synthetic materials, low wages, poor working conditions, intense production pressure, environmental pollution… While doing research for this post, I learned about another factor, at least for the U.S. [2].
In 2025, Reuters reported that a big reason SHEIN was able to keep prices so low in the U.S. was a trade loophole that allowed the company to ship millions of small parcels from China without paying import duties. When that exemption ended in 2025, prices started to rise almost immediately. Reuters tracked nearly 200 products over three months and found that some of the cheapest items became 50-70% more expensive, while a selection of ten products more than doubled in price. According to retail experts interviewed by Reuters, avoiding these import duties had been “a key feature” of SHEIN’s business model. So, part of SHEIN’s unbelievably cheap prices was made possible by avoiding costs that other retailers often have to pay [2]. Things are also changing in Europe. In 2026, the European Union introduced a €3 fee on low‑value e‑commerce parcels, a change that directly affects retailers like SHEIN. The fee increases their operating costs, and Reuters reports that consumer prices in Europe are likely to rise as platforms pass on at least part of these new charges [10]. But again, this extra money goes to customs fees, not to garment workers or the environment.
Even with these price increases, SHEIN remains one of the cheapest fashion retailers in the world. As one logistics expert told Reuters, “staying cheap is their whole brand.” [2] And that’s exactly why the concerns from four years ago are still relevant today. The underlying problem hasn’t changed. Fast fashion still creates the illusion that clothing has very little value and it encourages people to buy more than they actually need. Their prices don’t reflect what it actually costs to make clothing. When a brand is built around selling thousands of new styles at rock-bottom prices, those savings have to come from somewhere. Whether that’s through cheap synthetic materials or pressure on suppliers, the real price of those €5 dresses is paid by garment workers, local communities and the environment.
#3. Their production speed has become even more extreme
When I wrote my original article four years ago, the sources I found estimated that SHEIN uploaded between 700 and 2,000 new styles every day. I remember how shocked I was reading that. I honestly thought those numbers couldn’t get much crazier, but somehow they did. According to the 2025 Greenpeace report, SHEIN now adds more than 10,000 new garments on peak days and has around 500,000 different styles available on its website at any given time. Even more shocking, the average item remains available for just over two months before disappearing again, creating a constant pressure for consumers to buy before it’s gone [1].
The company still relies on the same ultra-fast production model. New designs are launched in very small batches and only produced on a larger scale if they sell well, allowing SHEIN to respond to trends almost instantly while continuously flooding its website with new products. Interestingly, while the company is incredibly fast at spotting trends and bringing new designs to market, shipping is often relatively slow. That’s because keeping costs low is prioritised over fast delivery, with standard shipping typically taking around 10 to 13 days. Behind the scenes, however, the scale of this operation is enormous. In 2024, SHEIN was estimated to ship around 900,000 parcels every day in the United States alone [3]. That means an unimaginable amount of clothing, packaging and transport moving around the world every single day. Every one of those garments requires raw materials, water, energy, chemicals and labour to produce. So, my conclusion remains the same and is even more pressing: the planet cannot sustain this level of production and consumption.
#4. Their workers are still being exploited
In my first article, I referred to Public Eye’s 2021 investigation into SHEIN’s supplier factories in China. After the report received international attention, SHEIN promised to improve working conditions by introducing stricter supplier standards and carrying out more audits. So, did anything actually change? According to Public Eye’s follow-up investigation, unfortunately not much.
In 2023, Public Eye returned to six factories supplying SHEIN and interviewed 13 workers. They found that 75-hour working weeks still appeared to be common, despite SHEIN’s own supplier code stating that employees should work no more than 60 hours per week and have at least one day off every week. One worker said he worked from 8:00 a.m. until 10:30 p.m. and only took one day off per month because he simply couldn’t afford to miss more work. The researchers also found that workers were still largely paid per garment produced rather than receiving a stable wage. Although some workers appeared to earn reasonable monthly incomes, those earnings were only possible because of the excessive overtime. When Public Eye recalculated their wages based on a normal working week, they found that the basic pay was only slightly above Guangzhou’s minimum wage and nowhere near what they considered a living wage [4].
The most disappointing conclusion is that many of the problems identified in 2021 still seem to exist today. Public Eye argues that SHEIN’s audits paint a much more positive picture than the experiences workers described during the interviews. In other words, despite the promises, there is little evidence that working conditions have fundamentally improved [4].
#5. The allegations of plagiarism keep growing
Four years ago, I shared just a handful of examples of independent artists and small businesses accusing SHEIN of copying their work. Since then, I’ve continued collecting these cases whenever designers or artists reached out to me or new reports surfaced online. What started as a few examples has grown into a separate article documenting more than 40 alleged copied designs, which you can find here (opens in new tab).
Unfortunately, these examples appear to reflect a much broader pattern rather than a series of isolated incidents. According to The Fashion Law, SHEIN is currently facing more than 30 ongoing lawsuits, the majority involving allegations of copyright, trademark or patent infringement. The cases have been brought by everyone from independent designers to well-known fashion brands, showing that this isn’t just an occasional mistake but a recurring criticism of the company [5]. One interesting development is that some creators now argue the problem goes beyond individual copied designs. In 2024, a proposed class action lawsuit was filed alleging that SHEIN uses algorithms and artificial intelligence to identify trending designs online and reproduce them at an enormous scale. According to the complaint, this allows the company to release thousands of new products every day while treating copyright infringement as part of its business model. These are allegations made by the plaintiffs and have not been proven in court, but they do show how seriously some creators view the issue [6].
Not every case ends with a court ruling, as many disputes are settled privately. However, in 2025, a Swedish court ruled that one of SHEIN’s subsidiaries had infringed the copyright of fashion retailer Nelly by using its product photographs without permission. While that case concerned copyrighted images rather than clothing designs, it demonstrates that at least some of the company’s intellectual property disputes have resulted in findings against SHEIN [7]. Even today, I still receive messages from small businesses and designers claiming that SHEIN has copied one or more of their designs. Combined with the growing number of lawsuits and allegations over the past four years, this suggests that concerns about copied designs remain just as relevant today as when I published my original article.
#6. Slightly more transparency, but still many unanswered questions
SHEIN has become somewhat more transparent. The company now publishes annual sustainability reports, discloses a bit more information about its supplier audits than it used to, and has increased the number of independent factory inspections. For example, in 2024 SHEIN revealed for the first time that it had found two cases of child labour at supplier factories in 2023. It also announced stricter policies, stating that suppliers caught employing children would face immediate termination. These are steps in the right direction towards more transparency, but it is still far from enough [9].
According to the Fashion Transparency Index (FTI), SHEIN scores poorly compared to many other major fashion brands. For the 2023 edition, this index assessed 258 indicators and SHEIN consistently landed in the 0–10% range, with an overall FTI score of 7/100, 9/100 for governance, and 0/100 for supply chain traceability [8]. Public Eye points out that, unlike many competitors, SHEIN still does not publish a list of its suppliers, making it extremely difficult for journalists, researchers and labour organisations to independently verify where its products are made or investigate working conditions. During their 2023 follow-up investigation, Public Eye repeatedly asked to see the full supplier audit reports that SHEIN referred to publicly, but those requests were denied. The organisation also criticised the published summaries for leaving out essential information, such as the number of hours employees worked to earn their reported wages [4].
To me, this illustrates the difference between transparency and accountability. Publishing sustainability reports, supplier policies and a Code of Conduct is a good first step, but it is only meaningful if those claims can be independently verified. Consumers deserve to know where their clothes come from, who made them and under what conditions they were produced. Until companies provide that level of openness, it remains difficult to hold them accountable for the promises they make.
Conclusion
I was hoping this update would paint a more positive picture. SHEIN may have made some improvements in terms of transparency, although this is reactive rather than proactive, forced by criticism and external scrutiny. Some of its prices have also increased. Normally, I’d consider higher prices a positive sign if they reflected better wages, safer working conditions or more sustainable production. But that’s not the case here, because much of the recent price increase is linked to changing import rules instead. So, after reading dozens of reports, investigations and news articles for this update, my overall conclusion hasn’t really changed.
The core of SHEIN’s business model is still built around producing enormous amounts of clothing at incredibly low prices and at an astonishing speed. That combination continues to create pressure throughout the entire supply chain. Whether it’s the heavy reliance on synthetic materials, the ever-increasing number of new products, reports of excessive working hours, the ongoing copyright disputes, or the limited transparency surrounding its suppliers, the underlying issues are all connected. They’re not isolated incidents, but consequences of a business model that prioritises growth, speed and low costs above almost everything else.
Ultimately, every purchase we make sends a signal about the kind of fashion industry we want to support. I’m not saying anyone has to be perfect or never buy from a fast-fashion brand again. Sustainable fashion isn’t about perfection; it’s about making more informed choices whenever we can. Hopefully this update has given you a clearer picture of where SHEIN stands today, so you can decide for yourself whether that’s a company you want to support.
Would love to hear from you in the comments below!
Want to read more? Check out my previous article where I researched what viscose is doing to Indonesian rainforests
Sources
- Greenpeace. (2025). Shame on you, Shein: Hazardous chemicals still found in fast fashion products. https://www.greenpeace.ch/static/planet4-switzerland-stateless/2025/11/9241ed86-shameonyoushein.pdf
- Reuters. (2025, July 25). How price increases are adding up at Shein. https://www.reuters.com/graphics/USA-TRUMP/TARIFF-SHEIN/lbpgzlrjzvq/
- Garland, M. (2024, August 29). Temu and Shein packages are flooding delivery networks. Will the surge persist? https://www.supplychaindive.com/news/temu-shein-shipping-delivery-industry-impact/725215/
- Classen, O., & Hachfeld, D. (2024, May 3). Interviews with factory employees refute Shein’s promises to make improvements. Public Eye. https://www.publiceye.ch/en/topics/fashion/interviews-with-factory-employees-refute-sheins-promises-to-make-improvements
- The Fashion Law. (2023, September 1). Shein: A Look at the legal landscape for an ultra-fast fashion giant. https://www.thefashionlaw.com/shein-a-look-at-the-legal-landscape-for-an-ultra-fast-fashion-giant/
- Gocher, C. (2025, September 22). Shein lawsuit alleges e-commerce giant uses AI to steal, sell copyrighted designs. https://www.classaction.org/blog/shein-lawsuit-alleges-e-commerce-giant-uses-ai-to-steal-sell-copyrighted-designs
- Reuters. (2025, October 24). Swedish fashion retailer Nelly appeals Shein copyright ruling. https://www.reuters.com/sustainability/boards-policy-regulation/swedens-nelly-appeals-ruling-shein-copyright-case-2025-10-24/
- Fashion Revolution. (2023). Fashion transparency index – 2023 edition.
- Reid, H. (2024, August 23). Shein reveals child labour cases as it steps up supplier audits. Reuters. https://www.reuters.com/business/retail-consumer/shein-reveals-child-labour-cases-it-steps-up-supplier-audits-2024-08-22/
- Reid, H., & Blenkinsop, P. (2026, July 1). EU slaps €3 fee on cheap ecommerce parcels in blow to Shein, Temu, AliExpress. https://www.reuters.com/business/retail-consumer/eu-slaps-3-fee-cheap-ecommerce-parcels-blow-shein-temu-aliexpress-2026-07-01/
