China's Weight Management Year: Clinics, Drugs, Online Sales

China made weight a public-health target in June 2024, when sixteen government departments and organisations launched a three-year campaign called Weight Management Year, and two years on its term is used about a quarter more online than before the launch, while online sales of weight-management products across three of China's largest marketplaces have changed gradually, according to Moojing Market Intelligence.

This article covers the first chapter of the full report, China Weight Management Industry Report 2023–2026, which sets out the campaign, the weight clinics and the GLP-1 drugs approved since 2024, and compares sales and posts from before and after the launch.

Key figures

• More than 5,500: medical institutions with a weight clinic by early 2026, according to the National Health Commission
• At least five: GLP-1 drugs available for weight loss in China after mazdutide's approval in June 2025
• About a quarter more: posts using the campaign's term, 体重管理, in the year to August 2026 than in the five months before the launch
• CN¥ 3.3 billion: online sales of the marketplaces' own weight-management categories in the year to August 2026

Method and scope: observed online sales across three of China's largest marketplaces, September 2023 to August 2026, and social listening on three social platforms, from Moojing Market Intelligence; not the total market, because physical stores, pharmacies, hospitals and several other marketplaces are not included. Growth rates are like for like. Policy and drug facts are from the sources linked.

What is China's Weight Management Year?#

Weight Management Year is a three-year national campaign launched in June 2024 by sixteen departments and organisations, including the National Health Commission (NHC). It calls for less oil, salt and sugar in processed food and promotes healthier canteens and restaurants, and health authorities asked qualified hospitals across the country to open weight clinics.

The campaign rests on survey figures the NHC published in 2020, which found 34.3% of Chinese adults overweight and 16.4% obese in surveys from 2015 to 2019. In April 2025 a weight-management drive was added to the Healthy China initiative's action plans, with the goal of slowing the rise in obesity by 2030, and health officials have warned that 70.5% of adults could be overweight or obese by then if current trends continue.

Almost all general, children's and traditional Chinese medicine hospitals run by national or provincial health authorities were to have a weight clinic by June 2025. By early 2026 more than 5,500 mid-sized and large medical institutions had one, and every large public general hospital must offer one during 2026, according to the State Council and Xinhua. Hangzhou has gone further with a local ordinance, in force from January 2026, that encourages retailers, restaurants and workplaces to label calories and offer healthier options.

Which GLP-1 drugs are approved for weight loss in China?#

At least five GLP-1 drugs are available for weight loss in China. The drug regulator approved semaglutide (sold as Wegovy) for weight management in June 2024 and tirzepatide in July 2024, and in June 2025 it approved Innovent's mazdutide. China Daily counted four drugs of the class available for weight loss before mazdutide, two of them made by domestic companies.

Basic medical insurance covers semaglutide for type 2 diabetes but does not reimburse weight-loss use for any medicine, China Daily reported, and tirzepatide joined the reimbursement list for type 2 diabetes in January 2026. Revised drug regulations in force since 15 May 2026 tighten oversight of online drug sales and of the platforms that host them.

Prices are coming down. In December 2025 Novo Nordisk confirmed it was adjusting Wegovy's prices in China, and Reuters, citing Yicai, put the new list prices of its two highest doses at CN¥ 987 and CN¥ 1,284 a month in some provinces. Semaglutide's core patent in China expired on 20 March 2026, and at least ten domestic drugmakers have filed for approval of their own versions. Innovent, which launched mazdutide in July 2025, set a recommended price of CN¥ 2,920 for four pens of its highest dose, Reuters reported.

Did the campaign change what China buys online?#

In our data the campaign shows most clearly in how people talk about weight. Online sales of the marketplaces' own weight-management categories and of protein powder do not break at June 2024, and both change gradually, according to Moojing Market Intelligence, while posts using the campaign's term peaked in March 2025, when it was promoted at the annual parliamentary sessions.

Exhibit 1. Source: Moojing Market Intelligence, observed marketplace data across three online marketplaces, sales by month of the marketplaces' own weight-management categories and of protein-powder titles; social listening on three social platforms, posts mentioning each keyword; each series indexed to its January to May 2024 average. In the shaded months one marketplace had moved to new categories, so the lighter line is not comparable with earlier months. Not the total market.

The weight-management shelf, the name the report gives to the marketplaces' own categories for weight management, weight loss, slimming or fat control, sold about CN¥ 3.3 billion in the year to August 2026. Like for like, its sales were 4% to 19% lower than two years earlier, depending on how one marketplace's category change is handled, and they moved in different directions on different marketplaces in each of the two years, so we draw no conclusion from the latest year's change. Cross-border supplements on two marketplaces make up about CN¥ 2.7 billion of the total. Over the same two years protein powder rose 33%.

Posts using 体重管理 averaged about 104,000 a month in the year to August 2026, a quarter more than in the five months before the launch, though fewer on one platform. That is 29% below the year before, when they averaged 146,000 a month and peaked at 340,000 in March 2025, as the head of the NHC promoted the campaign at the parliamentary sessions. Posts using the ordinary word for losing weight, 减肥, were more than a third below their level before the campaign. Our data cannot separate the campaign from the other causes of a change in sales.

How have sales and posts changed over two years?#

Over the two years to August 2026, online protein powder sales grew by about a third like for like across three of China's largest marketplaces, according to Moojing Market Intelligence, and posts about weight-loss injections rose almost eightfold against the months before the campaign, from a small base of about 900 a month.

Exhibit 2. Source: Moojing Market Intelligence, observed marketplace data across three online marketplaces, like-for-like growth compounded over the two years to August 2026; social listening on three social platforms, posts a month in the year to August 2026 against January to May 2024. A light bar marks a product whose sales moved in different directions on different marketplaces. The weight-management shelf's change is between −4% and −19%. The bar for weight-loss injections is cut off at the edge of the chart; its base before the campaign is about 900 posts a month. Not the total market.

Light meals, meal replacement, the dietary-fibre category and health foods titled "weight loss" each moved in different directions on different marketplaces, so we draw no conclusion from their combined two-year figures. Posts about the injections rose from about 900 a month before the campaign to about 7,000 a month in the year to August 2026, though they fell on one platform. We look at what those posts say in our article on weight-loss injection posts, and at the protein-powder figures in China online protein powder sales. The report's fifth chapter, which our article on four moves for brands summarises, sets out what the changes mean for large brands. The policy timeline, every exhibit and the method are in the full report, and our China health and nutrition market intelligence page covers the wider category.