These two types of e-commerce positions are being rapidly replaced by AI.
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Ever since the wave of AI large models was set off over the past three years, the topic of which jobs AI will replace has been closely watched. In the e-commerce industry, two types of positions with high demand are experiencing obvious impact from AI.
According to the "2026 E-commerce Industry Talent Market Insights" obtained by Wall Street Insights from 51job, in the first quarter of 2026, although customer service positions are still the largest category in demand for recruitment in the e-commerce industry, the number of positions is already seeing a significant year-on-year decline; meanwhile, the number of design positions has also dropped noticeably.
The shared characteristics of these two positions are: highly procedural, standardized, and reliant on repetitive content production for a long time. Now, with generative AI and intelligent automation tools rapidly entering e-commerce business processes, they are becoming the first batch of roles to be reshaped.
At the same time, another curve is rising rapidly—AI-related technical talent saw demand in the first quarter of 2026 reach a new high for nearly five quarters, more than doubling compared with the second quarter of 2025.
Over the past few years, customer service has always been one of the largest employment pools in the e-commerce industry. Whether for platform merchants, brands, or service providers, customer service roles have handled consulting, after-sales, order processing, and other basic tasks.
However, the maturity of AI customer service is beginning to change this logic.
Currently, intelligent customer service can handle the vast majority of standardized consultation scenarios, including product recommendations, order inquiry, returns and exchanges, after-sales issue handling, etc. Some companies are beginning to shift human customer service from "problem solvers" to "handlers of complex exceptions".
This means enterprises no longer simply expand customer service positions, but focus on high-capability operators.
Design positions are facing similar changes.
Previously, producing a product detail page, a marketing poster, or a batch of main image materials often required design teams to repeatedly create, modify, and deliver. Now, AIGC tools can already generate product main images, design posters, produce short video scripts and materials, and perform a large amount of basic work.
AI has not completely replaced designers, but it is compressing the demand for basic design labor.
For companies, this means content production costs are falling and iteration speed is increasing; for practitioners, it means the value of roles that depend solely on execution ability is decreasing.
Over the past decade, the core strengths of China's e-commerce industry have been supply chain capability and traffic operations capability; entering the AI era, companies are increasingly viewing efficiency optimization, user insights, and business decision-making abilities as new competitive barriers.
Aside from AI, the 51job report also reveals another emerging trend—globalization remains an important driving force in e-commerce growth.
51job data shows that the number of positions with keywords such as "cross-border" and "overseas business" in the job titles reached a nearly five-quarter high in the first quarter of 2026, with year-on-year growth approaching 20%, markedly higher than the overall industry recruitment growth rate.
Among them, "cross-border e-commerce operations" has consecutively appeared on the hot recruitment rankings for multiple quarters.
From a regional perspective, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, and Shanghai continue to be the cities with the highest concentration of recruitment demand. Their shared characteristics are mature supply chain systems, cross-border ecosystems, and international business foundations.
Behind this trend, Chinese e-commerce companies are collectively seeking new sources of growth.
From Southeast Asia to the Middle East, and then to Latin America, Chinese brands are continually advancing their global footprint. The expansion of cross-border e-commerce platforms such as TikTok Shop, Temu, SHEIN, and AliExpress is further driving growth in overseas job demand.
From recruitment signals, "cross-border + operations," "cross-border + content," "cross-border + data analysis," and "cross-border + AI" are becoming increasingly important talent combination abilities.
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