The landscape of urban commercial spaces has been undergoing a profound transformation in China, catalyzed by the accelerating forces of the digital era. Traditional retail locations, once dominated by street-facing storefronts occupying prime ground-floor positions, are now giving way to novel spatial configurations that challenge conventional assumptions about city-centered commerce. A comprehensive study spanning nearly a decade, from 2015 to 2023, across 287 Chinese cities, has revealed a nuanced picture of how commercial establishments evolve physically within the urban fabric, shaped markedly by digital consumer behavior, technological integration, and evolving urban economies.
Data derived from Dazhong-Dianping—a dominant public review and rating platform that aggregates information on commercial premises—provides a fertile foundation for examining this urban metamorphosis. The platform’s extensive dataset allows for a granular analysis of where shops are located in terms of building floors and orientation relative to street fronts. Intriguingly, the research exposes a significant spatial migration of commerce, pointing to a diminishing dominance of ground-floor, street-facing shops in favor of those hidden deeper inside street blocks or positioned on upper floors.
This commercial expansion exhibits both horizontal and vertical characteristics. Horizontally, shops are increasingly spreading within defined street blocks, filling interior spaces rather than relying solely on direct street access. Vertically, there is a systematic increase in shops occupying upper floors of buildings, a phenomenon that explicitly excludes traditional large-scale shopping centers, signaling a distinct commercial morphology that may be unique to China’s urban settings. This dual-axis expansion challenges established urban design paradigms that prioritize ground floors for retail visibility and accessibility.
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One of the most fascinating aspects of this spatial evolution is how it accelerated following the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic—a global disruptor that significantly altered consumer habits and commercial viability. Despite an overall decline in the total number of shops, the proportion of non-street-facing and non-ground-floor establishments rose steadily. The pandemic catalyzed a restructuring of urban commerce, accelerating trends already underway by pushing businesses to innovate their spatial strategies and tap into new consumer engagement patterns enabled by digital connectivity.
Particularly notable is the robust growth observed in experiential consumption sectors. Entertainment venues, exercise studios, beauty salons, and other services that rely heavily on direct user experience have demonstrated significant expansion, often utilizing these less-visible spaces. These sectors appear to thrive in settings that are not bound by the traditional prerequisites of street-level visibility, suggesting new modalities of customer attraction and retention powered by digital tools such as online booking systems, social media marketing, and community-driven review platforms.
The spatial transition correlates strongly with the socioeconomic stratification of cities. Higher-tier cities—characterized by greater income levels, urban amenities, and digital infrastructure—show an earlier and more intense adoption of these spatial patterns. This indicates a progressive urban commercial evolution wherein more developed cities serve as incubators for new forms of commerce, which then gradually diffuse to lower-tier cities. Such a gradient highlights the interplay between economic development, digital penetration, and urban spatial reconfiguration.
The implications of these findings extend well beyond academic discourse, providing critical insights for architects, urban planners, policymakers, and retail developers. Mixed-use development strategies, which integrate residential, commercial, and recreational functions within cohesive urban blocks, must account for this vertical and horizontal diversification of commercial space. Urban governance models, too, require adaptation to facilitate access, safety, and regulatory oversight of increasingly dispersed and vertically stratified commercial venues.
From a technical perspective, the study’s methodology harnesses big data analytics and geospatial information systems (GIS) to triangulate the physical location of commercial establishments with platform-generated consumer activity data. This integrative approach allows for dynamic mapping of urban commerce, revealing patterns that would remain invisible through traditional economic surveys or land-use studies. The use of user-generated content and real-time data streams from Dazhong-Dianping provides a novel lens into the evolving urban retail ecosystem.
One must also consider the infrastructural ramifications of this commercial shift. Vertical expansion prompts new demands on building design, notably in terms of accessibility, signage, elevator capacity, and emergency egress. Meanwhile, horizontal dispersion within blocks may necessitate enhanced pedestrian pathways, wayfinding systems, and micro-mobility options to maintain customer convenience. These infrastructural elements become critical in sustaining consumer traffic and ensuring the viability of enterprises tucked away from street-level prominence.
The digital era’s influence on commercial space is multifaceted, interweaving technology, consumer culture, urban form, and economic vitality. Online platforms do not merely catalog shops; they actively reshape commercial ecosystems by redefining visibility and consumer engagement circuits. A shop’s success increasingly hinges on its digital presence and customer feedback mechanisms rather than solely its physical storefront. Consequently, less-visible shops in upper floors or interior block locations can now compete effectively by leveraging digital marketing and e-commerce integration.
Moreover, the study captures a unique snapshot of urban commercial evolution during a period marked by unprecedented disruptions and innovations. The COVID-19 pandemic imposed harsh restrictions on physical mobility, curtailing traditional foot traffic and pushing consumers to adopt hybrid consumption methods combining online research, bookings, and offline visits. This behavioral change appears to have emboldened commercial actors to explore and optimize less conventional spatial settings, mitigating the economic fallout through adaptive spatial strategies.
The digital era’s role goes beyond consumer behavior to encompass the reconfiguration of supply chains, delivery logistics, and inventory management, all factors influencing commercial spatial choices. Shops located away from prime street level may benefit from integrated logistics solutions enabling quick delivery or pickup, reinforcing the viability of multi-floor and non-street-facing shops. This integration underscores a systemic shift in urban commercial operations wherein physical space is but one component of a broader omnichannel commerce network.
This research serves as a vital touchstone for future urban resilience and retail innovation. Understanding how commerce spatially adapts in the face of technological, social, and health shocks allows stakeholders to anticipate emerging trends, design flexible urban environments, and foster inclusive economic growth. It also challenges policymakers to reconsider zoning laws, leasing strategies, and urban regeneration projects to accommodate the emergent commercial typologies shaped by digital trajectories.
Ultimately, the study illuminates the evolving face of Chinese urban commerce as a dynamic interplay of ground realities and digital spheres. The steady, and now accelerated, expansion into less-visible urban spaces signals a departure from retail orthodoxy towards a hybrid spatial model. One that balances physical and digital presence, blending vertical and horizontal urban dimensions, driven by changing consumer expectations and technological empowerment.
As cities across the globe grapple with similar dynamics of digital transformation and pandemic-induced disruption, the patterns observed in China’s 287 urban centers offer a valuable paradigm. They invite a reconceptualization of what it means to commercialize urban space in an era where physical visibility is no longer the sole indicator of commercial success. This paradigm may well herald a new age of urban retail that is more spatially diverse, digitally interconnected, and experientially rich.
The findings underscore the importance of integrating technological insights with physical urban planning to foster vibrant commercial ecosystems. Such an approach reconciles the digital imperative with the tangible qualities of urban experience, thereby shaping cities that are not only adaptive and resilient but also attuned to the nuanced ways people live, work, and consume in the twenty-first century.
Subject of Research: The spatial evolution and expansion patterns of urban commercial establishments in China, focusing on horizontal and vertical growth within city blocks and buildings, and the influence of digital era dynamics from 2015 to 2023.
Article Title: The form of China’s urban commercial expansion in the digital era.
Article References:
Zhang, E., Hou, J. & Long, Y. The form of China’s urban commercial expansion in the digital era.
Nat Cities (2025). https://doi.org/10.1038/s44284-025-00254-6
Image Credits: AI Generated
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