Didi Chuxing, the local car hailing app that managed to get Uber to withdraw from the China market (and then discontinued support for Uber’s English interface Nov 26), is soon re-introducing a way to hail a ride in English: this time through their Didi app.
Expats have felt abandoned since support for Uber’s English interface was discontinued late last year, resulting in a convoluted set of difficult choices for the average Beijing-based laowai. While the original international version of Uber still works elsewhere, it does not work here. Didi Chuxing made a local version of Uber available, but in Mandarin only. Finally there is Didi, which is also in Mandarin only.
Despite the lack of an English interface, many expats have gravitated towards Didi due to a more thoroughly developed set of local services.
Now comes word that Didi Chuxing is resurrecting an English version. But rather than build it on top of the Chinese version of Uber, they’re going to do it with the Didi app.
We’ve heard from reliable sources that a basic English interface will be rolled out as early as spring or summer of this year, and the intention is to eventually make the app 100 percent bilingual. Foreign PR and advertising agencies have already been retained to help the company with the rollout.
As of now there has been no change in the Chinese Didi app for iPhone, but some Android users that download from the Google Play store are reporting a version of the app was released recently that has the beginnings of an English interface.
We checked China-based Xiaomi and Samsung app stores early Saturday evening but neither had English-enabled versions.
While in the process of trying to unearth the latest Didi iPhone app on the US Apple store, we did come across a fully English verison of Didi – but it turned out to be a shanzai version out of Vietnam that shamelessly uses the Didi name and logo to promote their car-hailing service (which appears to feature only female drivers):
While this app is fully in English, a spokesperson from Didi confirmed that this app has nothing to do with Didi as we know it here in Beijing. We were a little skittish about poking our credit card details into the Vietnamese version so we went no further to see if it works here in Beijing.
If you're a genuine Didi user that uses Google Play and has seen the English interface, let us know about your experience in the comments below.
Image: 51pr.com
I contacted Didi suppodt as i could not find the app and they said the beta testing is only with a few individuals registered and not available to everyone until beta testing is finished. Hopefully soon
Yeah we have gradually been getting our normal Chinese didi apps converted into English here in the office, so worth downloading that to see. See a sneak preview here. Hope yours is available soon too!
I've checked both the Google Play Store and Samsung App Store, both the US and HK versions, but can't find any sign of the Didi app, either in Chinese or in English. Links to the app previously posted by other websites no longer seem to lead anywhere.
If anyone has their version of the app from the Play Store, please share the link so I can take a look. Thanks. ^_^
Maybe its just me? But my didi app was upgraded to english this afternoon when i used it. Put some screenshot here https://www.murailledechine.com/201702-lapp-didi-passe-anglais.html
Great! What system are you using? Android? What app store is your phone connected to?
