měituán: 美团 - Meituan (Super-App for Local Services)

Keywords: Meituan, 美团, Měituán, Chinese food delivery app, China super app, Dianping, Meituan Waimai, what is Meituan, order food in China, local services app China, book hotels China, buy movie tickets China.

Summary: Meituan (美团) is the indispensable Chinese “super-app” for daily life, combining the functions of DoorDash, Yelp, Uber, Expedia, and Fandango into one powerful platform. While best known for its iconic yellow-clad food delivery army, Meituan is a one-stop shop for nearly any local service imaginable, from ordering groceries and booking movie tickets to finding hotels and reviewing restaurants. For anyone living in or visiting China, understanding and using Meituan is essential for navigating the modern, hyper-convenient digital landscape.

Pinyin (with tone marks): Měituán

Part of Speech: Proper Noun

HSK Level: N/A

Concise Definition: Meituan is a major Chinese technology company and the name of its “super-app” that offers a vast array of online-to-offline local services.

In a Nutshell: Think of “Meituan” not just as a company, but as a verb and a way of life in China. It's the default digital tool for solving immediate needs. Hungry? “Meituan it.” Bored? “Meituan it.” Need to buy something from a nearby store but don't want to go out? “Meituan it.” It represents the peak of convenience in China's mobile-first economy.

美 (měi): This character's primary meaning is “beautiful” or “good.” It's also the first character in the Chinese word for America, 美国 (Měiguó). In this context, it simply implies “good” or “excellent.”

团 (tuán): This character means “group,” “regiment,” or “to unite.” Its most relevant meaning here comes from the word 团购 (tuángòu), which means “group buying.”

The name 美团 (Měituán) literally translates to “Beautiful Group.” This name reflects the company's origins as a group-buying website, similar to Groupon, where groups of people could get good deals. While its business has expanded far beyond this, the name remains a legacy of its founding concept.

The “Super-App” Phenomenon: Meituan is a prime example of the “super-app” (超级应用 chāojí yìngyòng) model that dominates the Chinese internet. Unlike in the West, where we use separate apps for food delivery (DoorDash), reviews (Yelp), transportation (Uber), and bookings (Expedia), Chinese tech giants integrate all these functions into a single, seamless ecosystem. This creates incredible user convenience and “stickiness.”

Comparison to Western Services: To get the full Meituan experience in the US, you would need to open DoorDash to order lunch, then switch to Yelp to find a dinner spot, then open Fandango to book movie tickets, and finally use Expedia to book a hotel for the weekend. Meituan does all of this and more within one app, often with cross-promotions and a shared wallet.

The Backbone of Urban Life: Meituan and its army of delivery riders (骑手 qíshǒu) have fundamentally changed urban living. Office workers depend on it for lunch, families use it for grocery delivery, and young people use it to explore new entertainment options. The sight of Meituan's bright yellow electric scooters zipping through traffic is a ubiquitous part of any Chinese cityscape. This has created a massive gig economy, but also sparked discussions about labor conditions for its riders.

Ordering Food Delivery (点外卖 diǎn wàimài): This is the most common use. Users browse menus, place an order, pay with their phone, and track the delivery in real-time.

Finding and Reviewing Venues: Through its integration with 大众点评 (Dàzhòng Diǎnpíng), Meituan is the go-to platform for finding restaurants, karaoke bars, gyms, and other businesses, complete with user-submitted reviews and ratings.

Booking and Ticketing: Users can seamlessly book movie tickets (often with seat selection), train tickets, flights, and hotels directly within the app.

“Anything, Delivered”: Beyond food, Meituan can be used to order groceries, medicine, flowers, coffee, and almost any item from a local supermarket or convenience store, often with a 30-minute delivery promise.

“Verbing” the Brand: Much like “to Google,” it's becoming common in colloquial Chinese to use Meituan as a verb. For example, someone might say “我美团一下” (Wǒ Měituán yíxià), meaning “I'll just look it up/order it on Meituan.”

外卖 (wàimài) - The generic term for “food delivery” or “takeout.” This is the service you order on Meituan.

饿了么 (Èle.me) - “Are you hungry?”; Meituan's primary competitor in the food delivery space, owned by Alibaba and identifiable by its blue branding.

大众点评 (Dàzhòng Diǎnpíng) - “The Public's Reviews”; a powerful review service like Yelp, which was acquired by and is now fully integrated into Meituan.

骑手 (qíshǒu) - “Rider”; the official term for the delivery drivers who work for Meituan, Ele.me, and other platforms.

下单 (xiàdān) - “To place an order”; the verb for confirming your purchase on an app like Meituan.

团购 (tuángòu) - “Group buying”; the original business model of Meituan, now just one feature among many.

超级应用 (chāojí yìngyòng) - “Super-app”; the category of all-in-one applications that Meituan and WeChat exemplify.

红包 (hóngbāo) - “Red packet”; often used digitally within the app as promotional discounts or coupons to encourage orders.

支付宝 (Zhīfùbǎo) - Alipay; one of the two dominant mobile payment systems in China, frequently used to pay for orders on Meituan.

微信支付 (Wēixìn Zhīfù) - WeChat Pay; the other major mobile payment system, also fully integrated with Meituan.