Why is "rent instead of buy" favored? How can "everything can be rented" offer savings and risk avoidance?

Recently, driven by the longest Spring Festival holiday, China’s consumer market has been very lively. However, beyond “buying,” some people are now considering “renting” as a new option. From cameras and dresses to jewelry, robots, and home appliances, this Spring Festival, “everything can be rented” is not just a money-saving trick but also a new lifestyle.

Join the reporter’s lens to explore the rental market during the Spring Festival. Why is “rent instead of buy” so popular? How cost-effective is it? What new consumption scenarios has it created? What changes has it brought? How can “everything can be rented” help save money and avoid risks?

Lightweight Consumption Sparks New Vitality in Tourism Market

This Spring Festival, amid the continued rise of cultural and tourism consumption, rental services have become fully integrated into all aspects of travel, from professional cameras for scenic spots to outdoor skiing equipment. “Rent on demand, travel light” is now a new trend among tourists.

During the festival, in a photography store near the Shangxiahang Scenic Area in Fuzhou, customers came in nonstop to select and rent cameras. Many tourists chose to rent professional cameras to start their photo-taking journeys. The store offers a wide range of brands and models, precisely matching different needs.

For experienced photography enthusiasts, high-end telephoto lenses worth over 100,000 yuan make high-level ecological photography accessible.

Camera Store Sales Consultant Wen Qianqian: These lenses costing over 100,000 yuan are mainly used for bird ecology photography. We use this low-cost rental method to reach target groups. From initially renting cameras to possibly purchasing one directly.

Customer Liu Xinxuan: I’ve been renting cameras before to try them out. The experience was great, so today I decided to buy.

The survey found that some camera rental stores have expanded into diverse business models, offering photography classes and organizing special travel photo shoots, leading photography enthusiasts to bird-watching spots. This not only increased store revenue but also boosted local homestays and catering services, promoting the “bird-watching economy” and eco-tourism.

Bird-Watching Tour Guide Xie Fanglin: Almost every month, groups come here. We provide transportation, accommodation, and shooting assistance, all by local villagers, which gives us development opportunities.

From renting a camera to activating an entire industry, the rental economy leverages lightweight methods to meet the demand for heavy assets and promotes the coordinated development of supporting services. In Mingxi County, Fujian Province, famous for eco-bird watching, over 30,000 bird-watching tourists visit annually, generating over 2 billion yuan in output.

At Wanfeng Ski Resort in Tonghua, Jilin, ski equipment rental is also popular. The resort offers over 5,000 sets of gear from various brands, sizes, and styles, from beginner to professional levels.

In popular tourist cities like Xi’an, Chengdu, Xiamen, and Kaifeng, clothing rental shops are booming, with Hanfu, Tang suits, and ethnic-style long skirts becoming trendy around scenic spots. This Spring Festival, car rental platforms also saw a significant increase in orders. According to Shenzhou Car Rental, bookings during the holiday increased by 20% year-on-year, with a record high for long-term rentals of nine days or more.

Tech Rental

Unlocking New Industry Possibilities

The popularity of cultural tourism rentals not only meets tourists’ demand for relaxed, efficient, and high-quality travel but also promotes refined upgrades in tourism services. By offering affordable rentals as an entry point, it has transitioned from single-item rentals to diversified services, expanding consumption scenarios. During the 2026 Spring Festival Gala, robot performances wowed audiences. This Spring Festival, robot rentals have moved from niche novelty to mainstream consumption, unlocking new industry possibilities through tech rentals.

In Shanghai, a leading robot rental platform experienced explosive order growth, with over 1,000 orders from the Lunar New Year’s Day to the seventh day. Entertainment and commercial marketing robots have become market mainstays.

Chief Marketing Officer Li Kewei of Qingtian Rental (Shanghai) Technology Co., Ltd.: We already have 200,000 registered users and about 500 service providers nationwide. When a customer places an order on our platform, our customer service team immediately follows up, communicates, and quickly matches with a service provider.

As robot functions continue to upgrade and application scenarios expand, robot rentals have evolved from experimental trials to professional services aligned with market needs.

Li Kewei: Previously, buying a robot meant purchasing an expensive experimental product. Now, it’s about getting a robot that better fits your needs. This will generate incremental value for many industries, and the scale of this increment will be enormous.

In the core of the digital economy, computing power leasing is becoming a “must-have” for AI industry development. As the core productivity of the digital economy, demand for computing power is diverse and fragmented. Traditional long-term cloud leasing models cannot meet short-term, centralized needs. Tsinghua University’s post-00s startup team identified this pain point, integrating over 30 data centers, three major cloud providers, 700,000 idle internet cafe computers, and 30,000 personal computers to launch a per-second billing, fine-grained computing power leasing service, enabling on-demand and flexible resource allocation.

CEO Fu Zhi of Gongji Technology Co., Ltd.: Most cloud providers have built their own data centers, investing hundreds of millions. When leasing to you, offering precise leasing means the idle costs are borne by the cloud provider. We use resources from thousands of households to serve specific needs, charging you by the minute, avoiding waste.

Currently, the company serves over 100 AI firms, helping them reduce costs and improve efficiency through flexible computing power leasing, addressing critical demand.

Liang Ding, CTO of VAST: Computing power is vital for an AI company—like a traditional power plant needs coal. It determines our R&D speed and how many users can be supported online. We want as much flexible computing power as possible, so we can better meet our needs.

Public Welfare Leasing Provides Inclusive Services

Enhancing Quality of Life

The investigation shows that “rent instead of buy” deeply integrates into daily life and is a key driver of consumption upgrades. In the public welfare sector, toy rentals and rehabilitation aids address common consumer pain points.

In Handan, Hebei, a shared toy store has become a favorite spot for local parents. The store offers hundreds of toys, including educational blocks, electric toys, and plush dolls, catering to children of different ages. This toy rental service is popular among young families.

Young families today want diverse toys for their children but face high prices, quick boredom, and limited space at home. Toy rentals solve these issues. The store enforces strict disinfection protocols, ensuring safe play.

In Jiaxing, Zhejiang, rehabilitation aids rental has become a new highlight in elderly care. The center offers over 40 types of assistive devices, including wheelchairs, multi-functional transfer machines, smart nursing beds, and stair-climbing aids. Originally costing thousands or tens of thousands of yuan, daily rental prices are below 5 yuan, with smart nursing beds as low as 0.4 yuan per day.

Currently, the number of reservations for assistive device rentals in Jiaxing grows over 40% annually. Local authorities have set up multiple rental service points based on the “convenience” principle.

Zheng Xiling, Deputy Director of the Elderly Work and Social Welfare Department of Jiaxing Civil Affairs Bureau: Besides the city-level centers, we have set up rental points in town and street elderly care service centers, village community care centers, and some elderly care institutions to help seniors enjoy a better quality of life.

2024 China Rental Economy Transaction Scale

Surpassing 4.2 Trillion Yuan

In July 2025, the Development Research Center of the State Administration for Market Regulation released the first “White Paper on the Healthy Development of the Consumer Rental Industry under the Circular Economy.” It states that in 2024, China’s rental economy transaction scale exceeded 4.2 trillion yuan, serving over 750 million users. The market size surged 116% year-on-year in 2024, with a projected compound annual growth rate of 80.3% from 2025 to 2029, reaching 40 times the 2023 level by 2029.

From cultural tourism and travel to tech industries, from family parenting to elderly care, and from tangible physical rentals to intangible resource sharing, the application scenarios of the rental economy are continuously expanding. How does “rent instead of buy” create new consumption scenes and what new changes does it bring? Experts offer insights.

“Everything Can Be Rented” Leading a New Consumption Trend

Opening New Development Tracks

Professor Su Li of the School of Applied Economics at Renmin University of China: China’s rental economy is in a rapid development phase, creating many new tracks in the consumer sector and becoming a new engine for economic growth. “Rent instead of buy” lowers consumption barriers, transforming potential demand into actual consumption. It not only stimulates consumption but also pushes traditional industries and services to transform, improving quality. It drives innovation and development in related industries and fosters professional service demands, accelerating digital transformation and mode innovation. Overall, the rental economy is becoming a key driver for industrial upgrading and high-quality economic development in China.

How to Enjoy Benefits and Avoid Risks in “Everything Can Be Rented”

Moving from “buy” to “rent” is not just a rational upgrade in consumption concept but also a key leap from “product possession” to “service enjoyment.” While rentals are booming, issues also arise. As the rental economy extends into consumer markets, what weak regulatory links exist? How can “everything can be rented” be cost-effective and risk-averse?

Balancing New Business Models and Consumer Rights

Su Li: In terms of consumer rights protection, the rental economy has clear weaknesses. Some platforms face information asymmetry, irregular services, difficulty in refunding deposits, and quality assurance issues. Additionally, regulation of emerging formats like computing power and pet rentals is also a challenge.

Su Li: First, we need to accelerate the improvement of relevant laws and regulations, possibly formulating specific regulations or departmental rules for the rental economy, clarifying key aspects such as rental contract formats, deposit management, platform responsibilities, and dispute resolution. We should innovate regulatory models, utilizing big data, AI, blockchain, and other technologies to enhance precision and efficiency, enabling early risk detection, warning, and resolution.

Su Li: Second, we should establish a collaborative governance system combining government regulation, industry self-discipline, and platform autonomy, building mechanisms for information disclosure, contract standardization, credit evaluation, and complaint handling. Special attention should be paid to deposit and prepayment regulation to ensure fund safety. Establish quality standards for rental items and clarify repair and compensation responsibilities. Ultimately, this will form a mature, standardized new ecology of the rental economy, becoming a vital force for high-quality economic development in China.