Visas and entry

Find your rule

There are four ways into mainland China, and which one you can use depends almost entirely on the passport you hold. Choose it below and the rest of this guide will mark what applies to you.

The short version: nationals of 50 countries can enter visa-free for 30 days, another 29 countries have bilateral agreements, 57 can pass through for up to ten days on the way somewhere else, and everyone else applies for a visa before travelling. Hong Kong and Macau have their own, more generous rules and count as separate regions for all of this.

Visa-free entry for 30 days

If your country is on China’s unilateral list, you arrive with an ordinary passport and get stamped in. There is no form, no fee and no advance registration, and you do not have to tell the embassy you are coming.

The rules that matter:

• Thirty calendar days, counted from midnight after the day you arrive. Land on the 1st and you must leave by the 31st. The exemption cannot be extended; anyone who needs longer for a good reason applies to the local exit-entry police for a stay permit, and should not count on getting one.
• Multiple entries are fine. No limit on the number of visits or the total days is currently published. Purpose still has to fit each time.
• Purposes: business, tourism, visiting family or friends, exchanges and transit. Conferences, exhibitions, sports events and study tours count as long as they fit in 30 days. Work, study and journalism do not, and need the proper visa.
• Passport: an ordinary passport valid for at least your intended stay. Emergency travel documents do not qualify. Airlines commonly insist on six months’ validity, so keep to that.
• Any port, from anywhere. You can arrive by air, sea or land at any port open to foreigners, and it does not matter which country you fly in from.

The United Kingdom and Canada joined on 17 February 2026. Russia’s exemption runs to 31 December 2027 and Brunei’s has no end date; the other 48 run to 31 December 2026. The United States, India, Czechia and Lithuania are not on the list.

Have these ready, printed or on your phone. They are rarely asked for at the border, but airlines check tickets at departure and officers can ask about your plans:

• A return or onward ticket.
• Your first hotel booking, or the address of the friends you are staying with.
• An invitation letter if you are coming for business.

Visa-free under a bilateral agreement

China has mutual visa-exemption agreements with 29 countries that cover ordinary passports. They work like the unilateral exemption at the border, but the terms are written into a treaty, so they are steadier: they are not extended year by year, and they do not lapse on a date.

Most agreements allow up to 30 days per visit. Several also cap total time at 90 days in any rolling 180-day period, however many entries you make, so frequent visitors need to keep a tally. The finder above shows the figures for your passport where an official page states them.

• 30 days per visit and 90 days in any 180: Antigua and Barbuda, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Malaysia, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Thailand, Uzbekistan.
• 90 days in any 180: Albania, Armenia, Bosnia and Herzegovina.
• 30 days per visit: Bahamas, Barbados, Dominica, Fiji, Maldives, Qatar, Serbia, Seychelles, Singapore, Suriname, United Arab Emirates. Belarus adds a cap of 90 days per calendar year.
• Longer: Mauritius 60 days, San Marino three months.
• Not stated in the official table: Grenada and Tonga. Ask the Chinese embassy before you book.
• Ecuador suspended its side of the agreement in 2024. Confirm that entry to China is still visa-free before you fly.

Visa-free transit for 240 hours

The transit exemption is for people passing through China on the way somewhere else, and it is generous enough to be a holiday in itself: up to ten days, most of the country’s big cities, no visa. Nationals of 57 countries can use it, including the United States. Processing happens at the border; there is nothing to apply for in advance.

The conditions:

• Third country or region. Your onward ticket must be to somewhere other than the country or region you arrived from, with a confirmed date and seat, departing within 240 hours. Bangkok to Shanghai to Bangkok does not qualify; Bangkok to Shanghai to Hong Kong does. Hong Kong and Macau count as onward destinations.
• Designated ports. Enter through one of the 65 listed ports. Most major airports are on the list, plus several sea ports, the Mohan rail port from Laos, and, since November 2025, the Hong Kong high-speed rail station at West Kowloon and the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge.
• Permitted areas. You may move between the 24 covered regions, but only within them. Eighteen are whole provinces or municipalities; in Shanxi, Heilongjiang, Jiangxi, Guangxi, Sichuan and Yunnan only named cities are open. Tibet, Xinjiang, Gansu, Qinghai, Ningxia, Inner Mongolia and Jilin are not covered at all.
• Counting. The 240 hours start at midnight after the day you arrive.
• Purpose. Tourism, business, visits and family reunions. Not work, study or reporting.
• Passport. An ordinary passport; officials at the ports ask for at least three months’ validity. A previous visa refusal stamp or a record of overstaying in China disqualifies you.

1. 1Book the onward ticket first and keep it accessible; you will show it at check-in and at the border.
2. 2Fill in the online arrival card before you fly. It is free, on the National Immigration Administration site.
3. 3On arrival, follow the signs for the visa-free transit counter rather than the normal immigration line, and have your onward ticket and hotel details ready.
4. 4Keep your boarding passes and the stamped card until you leave, and leave from an open port before your 240 hours run out.

Kyrgyzstan and Vietnam were added on 20 August 2026. Indonesia joined in June 2025.

Anyone of any nationality can also transit within 24 hours without a visa, as long as they hold a confirmed onward international ticket and stay in the port’s restricted area. Leaving the airport within those 24 hours needs a temporary entry permit from the border inspection counter.

Regional visa-free schemes

Four smaller exemptions cover particular places, and two of them do not depend on your nationality at all.

Hainan for 30 days. Nationals of 61 countries, including the United States, can fly directly to Haikou or Sanya and stay anywhere in Hainan province for up to 30 days without a visa, for tourism, business, visits, medical treatment, conferences or sports. You cannot continue to the mainland on this exemption, and it is not for work or study.

From Hong Kong or Macau in a tour group, 6 days. Nationals of any country with diplomatic relations with China can join a tour organised by a Hong Kong or Macau travel agency and enter ten Guangdong cities (Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Zhuhai, Foshan, Huizhou, Dongguan, Zhongshan, Jiangmen, Zhaoqing and Shantou), or Hainan, for up to six days. You enter and leave with the group.

Cruise tour groups, 15 days. Groups of two or more arriving by cruise ship, organised by a China-registered travel agency, can enter at cruise ports in Beihai, Dalian, Guangzhou, Haikou, Lianyungang, Qingdao, Sanya, Shanghai, Shenzhen, Tianjin, Wenzhou, Xiamen and Zhoushan, then travel in Beijing and the eleven coastal regions for up to 15 days before leaving on the same ship.

ASEAN tour groups, 6 days. Groups of two or more from Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand or Vietnam, organised by a China-registered travel agency, can enter Guilin through its airport, or Xishuangbanna through Gasa airport or the Mohan rail and road ports, and stay in that area for up to six days.

Applying for a visa

If no exemption covers your passport or your trip, apply for a tourist (L) visa before you travel. The process is slower than it should be but it is predictable, and it comes with no onward-ticket condition and longer stays.

1. 1Complete the online application form (COVA) at the site your embassy or visa centre links to, and upload your documents; the form checks the photo as you go.
2. 2Once the online pre-check clears, take your passport and the printed application to the Chinese Visa Application Service Centre in your country, or, in the United States, straight to the embassy or a consulate. Many posts no longer require an appointment.
3. 3Pay the fee and collect the passport with the visa. Regular processing is about four working days from acceptance; express and rush cost more and take three or two.

What to bring:

• A passport valid for more than six months with at least two blank pages.
• A recent photo to the Chinese spec: 48 by 33 mm, white background, no glasses that hide the eyes.
• Round-trip ticket and hotel bookings, or an invitation letter, for most posts. Applicants in the United States have been excused from these since 2024.
• Fingerprints are waived for short-term visas (stays up to 180 days) until 31 December 2026, except for a few categories. Children under 14 and adults over 70 are always exempt.

Fees for the nationalities we could confirm on an embassy page, all under reduced schedules that run to 31 December 2026. Visa centres add their own service fee on top:

Ten-year multiple-entry visas exist for several nationalities and are worth it if you expect to return.

At the border

Immigration is orderly and usually quick. Fingerprints are scanned on arrival for everyone aged 14 to 70. If you are asked questions, they will be about your itinerary and where you are staying. Keep answers simple and consistent with your bookings.

If your passport is lost or stolen while you are in China, the steps to replace it and leave are in Health and emergencies.

Common mistakes

• Booking a hotel that does not take foreigners. Some budget hotels are not licensed to register foreign guests. Filter for “accepts foreign guests” on booking sites, or stick to chains and hostels that mention it.
• Assuming Hong Kong counts as China. For visa purposes it is a separate region. Entering the mainland from Hong Kong is a fresh entry, and on the transit rule Hong Kong is a valid onward destination.
• Flying out to the country you came from and expecting the transit exemption. The onward ticket must be to a third country or region. Officers check it before they stamp you in.
• Treating the transit exemption as a visa. Ten days, only inside the 24 covered regions, and only through the designated ports. A side trip to Xinjiang or Tibet is not possible on it.
• Counting the days loosely. Thirty days means thirty calendar days, weekends and holidays included. Overstaying costs a fine and leaves a record that makes the next visa harder.

Sources

Everything above was checked against these official pages in September 2026. If one of them has changed since, tell us with the feedback buttons below.

1. List of countries covered by unilateral visa exemption policies (NIA), 17 Feb 2026.
2. Visa-free transit policies: 24-hour and 240-hour (NIA), 20 Aug 2026.
3. Regional visa-free entry policies for foreign nationals (NIA), 20 Aug 2026.
4. FAQs on visa-free entry into China (Chinese Embassy in Sweden), 25 May 2026.
5. Foreign Ministry remarks on including Canada and the UK in the visa-free programme, 15 Feb 2026.
6. China extends visa-free policy for Russian citizens to end of 2027 (State Council), 20 May 2026.
7. Details of mutual visa exemption agreements (NIA), 14 Apr 2025.
8. Table of mutual visa exemption agreements (Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in Chinese), 25 Feb 2026.
9. Ten measures including the online arrival card and five new transit ports (NIA), 3 Nov 2025.
10. Online accommodation registration pilot (State Council), 21 Mar 2026.