LCSC is a lie. (or isn't it?) My version of rant.

[Yansi]

Hi,
just got to a point I needed to resupply some stock of electronic components in my stash, namely SMT stuff.  So, heard about how great LCSC is for sourcing cheap, I was quickly brought out of the dream.

For example:
0805 100n 50V X7R:  $38+ per reel.
0603 100n 16-25V: again over $20 a reel.

I can get both for half to two thirds the price even from a local distributor. No, not Mouser, not Farnell, not Digikey, a local one, in our small shitty country. 

I have a feeling, last time I checked LCSC, prices seemed to be worth a try. I am not sure what or if I have smoked that day, but the prices now are just well above normal.

So, after all, what's the LCSC good for? Prices are anywhere but interesting (I have even checked small semiconductors - leading to about the same prices I can get anywhere else), so what may be the case one would go sourcing from LCSC?

Just asking, as passive SMD components aren't them. So what is?

[sokoloff]

What about that suggests that LCSC “is a lie”?!

That they don’t have the world’s lowest price doesn’t make them a lie when they didn’t claim they did.

[Yansi]

That literally a couple days ago it showed prices in the range of $6 to $15 a reel of those caps, and now, when decided to order them, signed in using my JLC account it shows a completely different pricing?

//EDIT: Interesting to note, that even if I now sign out, the elevated pricing remains. So either they in fact just increased pricing drastically and I failed to order when pricing was still good, or this is just a part of social engineering.

[OwO]

LCSC has a mostly fixed but not necessarily the lowest margin. For example for some passives it's not much cheaper than mouser/digikey, but there are quite a few parts that are easily 1/5th of the price at LCSC compared to mouser. e.g. INA199 (1.2yen vs 5yen), u.fl connectors (hirose branded) (0.4yen vs 4yen), ada4932 (12yen vs 45yen), adf4351 (25yen vs 105yen), XC7A75T (170yen vs 900yen), etc.

[SteveyG]

Where are you getting them from cheaper than that for a reel of 4000? It's cheaper to by the Yageo capacitors from LCSC than anywhere I can see on Octopart 

[Yansi]

Octopart does not list all existing distributors, just some of the bigger ones, that probably pay them to get listed.

Cheapest reel of 0805 100n 50V X7R at LCSC is probably Yageo AC0805KRX7R9BB104 for $38 (+VAT+customs fee), but I can get  a reel of Yageo CC0805KRX7R9BB104 from a local (but well known in EU) distributor, for $19.25 (+VAT). Go figure!

//EDIT: Added price tag for LCSC parts.
//EDIT2: Even reel of Samsung branded caps (CL21B104KBCNNNC) are cheaper at just $21.9, than LCSC Yageo.

[wraper]

Cheap capacitors are simply out of stock. You should not expect everything to be cheaper that anywhere else. There are very good deals but not for everything you may want. For example they have Bourns PTC fuses 10 times cheaper than anywhere else. Cheap LDO, including from TI and Richtek besides some extremely cheap from lesser known brands. Cheap crystals and connectors.
By EU distributor I guess you mean TME which itself is an exception for low passive and some other component prices. Again not for everything, many things are cheaper at Mouser or Farnell. Many parts simply not available.
Also many may find LCSC good for low price premium at low quantities. I assume many hobbyists brag about it particularly because of this reason.

[OwO]

CC0805KRX7R9BB104 *IS* available from LCSC at $14 per reel: https://item.szlcsc.com/50686.html
It's backorder but website shows 703 reels of orders in the past month, so it means people *are* buying these and LCSC simply doesn't have stock because all orders are multiples of reels.

[OwO]

CL21B104KBCNNNC is also available: https://item.szlcsc.com/2063.html
At $16 per reel (compared to your $21 per reel).
If you search "100nf 0805 50v" and sort by orders, you will see the most sold ones (reaching 3000 reels/month) are those "out of stock", which means anyone serious who is buying many reels of capacitors for production are backordering. There is a shortage of 100nF MLCC right now, so this makes sense.

[Yansi]

Sure, they list a LOT of things they do not have any stock of.

I am more interested in stuff that I can buy, not that is just listed, so I have ignored all P/Ns that aour out of stock.

[ataradov]

They replenish their stock pretty regularly, come back and check in a week. LCSC is not a lie, but it is also not magic. Pick whatever distributor works better for you.

DigiKey also has a ton of non-stock listings.