China Starter Guide

Recent updates

A short record of new tools, reviewed paths, and guide changes. Check here before your next trip so you know what has been improved.

What changed

  1. Clarified airport transfers, drone rules, safety, and English expectations

    Put the direct traveler questions into four high-intent titles and opening answers so visitors can decide what to prepare before arrival.

  2. Sharpened city, customs, and payment search answers

    Reworked high-intent titles and opening answers for Guangzhou versus Shenzhen, China customs, QR payments, and payment setup in Korean.

  3. Improved hotel check-in, customs, and city-choice answers

    Clarified hotel check-in timing, added a practical customs preflight, and sharpened the Korean Guangzhou-versus-Shenzhen decision guide for first-time visitors.

  4. Added arrival-card guidance in French, Korean, and Indonesian

    The official online arrival-card process is now available in three additional languages, with direct links from the existing entry and visa checklists.

  5. Improved payment, airport, customs, and city-choice paths

    Reviewed high-intent landing pages, repaired a stale verification date, improved the Guangzhou-or-Shenzhen search title, and added next-step links that move visitors into payment, arrival, and customs checklists.

  6. Refreshed visa-free and arrival decision paths

    Updated the 240-hour transit rule with current National Immigration Administration references and connected the visa, first-trip, and arrival-card guides so visitors can move from eligibility to preparation without starting over.

  7. Reviewed SIM, rail, and medicine guidance against current official sources

    Clarified Beijing-specific SIM arrangements, refreshed the 12306 English FAQ reference, and added China Customs guidance on truthful declaration and reasonable personal-use quantities for medicines.

  8. Added a current China arrival card guide

    Explains the official online arrival-card channels, the information to prepare, the port fallback, and why the card is separate from visas, customs, and health declarations.

  9. Added a saved trip setup checklist

    You can now mark entry, documents, payment, phone, transport, hotel, safety, and arrival tasks without creating an account.

  10. Reworked the first paths for new visitors

    The homepage now starts with entry, payment, and first-72-hours paths, with clearer next-guide links after each step.

  11. Improved search answers for high-opportunity guides

    Updated the search summaries for airport transfers, payment, city choice, medicines, drones, customs, overstays, privacy, and medical costs.