I have purchased one thing from AliExpress ever, and it was kind of a miserable experience, so I don’t foresee myself doing it again. But I’m still unfortunately well aware of the range of goods the site offers, thanks to Instagram ads. A friend of mine got served one recently that could only be the product of AI’s vast, cursed imagination, and it’s so absurd that I had to share it here.
Titled the “2024 Personality Creative Casual Fashion Luxury Style Backpack School Bag Male Girlfriend Birthday Gift,” (you may have to switch your region outside of the U.S. to view it), this is a backpack shaped like the rear end of a Porsche 911—sometimes. Because while two of the images definitely present a 911-esque design, as we can see below, one of them doesn’t really correspond to any car at all. It doesn’t even share the obviously very functional spoiler of the examples in the other pictures.
Slop like this is unfortunately just a part of everyday life now, and more than anything, I’m curious what I would actually receive if I spent the—deep breath now—$200 plus $130 in shipping to get it. Would it be a picture of the backpack? Which backpack would it look like—the one with the carbon diffuser or the body-color one? If by some miracle it was a real backpack, how would you even open the damn thing without obvious zippers anywhere? I have many questions, but unfortunately, The Drive’s editorial budget doesn’t really allow me to satisfy that curiosity.
The “2024 Personality Creative Casual Fashion Luxury Style Backpack School Bag Male Girlfriend Birthday Gift” was a mystery to me. But I didn’t want to wait for the 2025 model to drop, so I did some more digging. What I found was another 911-shaped bag—and this one, dare I say, kind of does look real.
Called the “Camping Bag Men’s backpacks Tactical backpack Women’s bag Backpack backpack school,” this version is more affordable despite being four times the backpack of the other one, priced at $83 with $53 for shipping and handling. Still quite expensive, but at least the pictures don’t appear to have been generated by Grok, so I’d wager that there’s more of a chance of receiving a physical product here.
Up close, we see its hard shell has the texture of a car’s dashboard, and there are exactly two pockets within. Otherwise, you have the entire inside of a 911’s ass to store oddly shaped objects. It’s not exactly the most practical shape for cargo—it’s better suited for engines, after all.
Perhaps a backpack modeled in the image of a different car would be a little more usable. I imagine the 911 can’t be the only car anyone’s ever wanted to carry on their shoulders. Despite my searching, however, I couldn’t find another bag with a similar slant. Not a Dodge Challenger backpack, or a Tesla-shaped backpack, or an angry Lamborghini backpack. From what I can tell, this appears to be a purely Porsche-centric affair.
Anyway, I know back-to-school season is kicking off, but nobody should order the “Camping Bag Men’s backpacks Tactical backpack Women’s bag Backpack backpack school,” especially not for $136. That said, if you assess the risks and decide to anyway, I 1) can’t stop you and 2) thank you for your bravery. Please share a photo of whatever you receive. It could be the bag pictured, or a printed picture of it, or a lawn chair, or nothing. You never really know with AliExpress, and that’s part of the fun.