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Travel guides

Practical guides for China

Plain answers, checked against current rules, with sources.

Visa & entry

Visa & entry

China visa and entry rules for tourists

Whether you need a visa at all, how the 240-hour transit scheme works, and why every rule here carries an expiry date.

7 min read · Last updated September 30, 2026

Money & payments

Money & payments

Payments and money in China for tourists

How to set up Alipay and WeChat Pay on a foreign card, what the fees are, and what to do when your bank declines the binding.

6 min read · Last updated September 30, 2026

Money & payments

Shopping in Shanghai: where to go, what to buy, what to watch for

Shanghai's shopping areas do different jobs: Nanjing Road and Huaihai Road are commercial streets, the Xintiandi area is malls and brands, Yu Garden is souvenirs, and the outlets are out of town. Here is what each is for, plus the real position on bargaining and tax refunds.

7 min read · Last updated October 1, 2026

Money & payments

How to claim the departure tax refund in Shanghai: procedure and preconditions

The departure tax refund returns part of the consumption tax on goods you buy in China and take out unused, and claims fail over sequence rather than amounts: the participating shop, the passport at the till, the refund form, the customs endorsement before check-in, and the refund desk after security.

6 min read · Last updated October 8, 2026

Money & payments

Buying tea and silk in Shanghai: how to tell, where to buy, what to watch for

Tea and silk are the two things visitors most often buy badly in Shanghai: what it means that tea is priced by grade and origin and silk by fibre content, what you can actually see and test in a shop, the set-ups to recognise, and what is worth buying.

8 min read · Last updated October 13, 2026

Money & payments

Budget stays in Shanghai: hostels, guesthouses and the cheaper options

Shanghai's budget end is where the gap between the listing and the room is widest; what hostel dorms, private rooms, small hotels, chain business hotels, guesthouses, pods and shared flats each buy, and what each gives up.

7 min read · Last updated October 29, 2026

Money & payments

Shanghai's specialist wholesale markets: how they work and what to buy

A wet market sells food to households; a specialist wholesale market sells one category to the trade, and to anyone who walks in. Here are the seven kinds, what you can buy in each, and why the wholesale way of selling trips a visitor up on the first purchase.

7 min read · Last updated October 30, 2026

Internet & apps

Internet & apps

Internet, SIM cards and apps in China

The eSIM routing question, what the Great Firewall blocks, where VPNs stand legally, and what to install before you fly.

6 min read · Last updated September 30, 2026

Internet & apps

Buying electronics and plug adapters in Shanghai

What the sockets look like, what 220 volts means for 110-volt equipment, where to buy an adapter, and why a phone should not be replaced here.

7 min read · Last updated October 26, 2026

Transport

Transport

Getting around Shanghai: metro, taxis, bikes, buses and the ferry

Shanghai is huge, but the ways of moving inside it are few, and each has a clear job. This covers the metro, taxis and ride-hailing, shared bikes, buses, walking and the Huangpu ferry, plus airport and railway links.

7 min read · Last updated October 4, 2026

Transport

Pudong or Hongqiao: choosing between Shanghai's two airports

Shanghai has two airports, but which one you use is usually not your decision. This sets out what each is for, the real differences in distance and ground transport, and what to do when a trip needs both.

7 min read · Last updated October 5, 2026

Transport

Shanghai's railway stations: which one, and how the station works

Shanghai has several main railway stations and your train decides which one you use. This covers how the stations divide the directions, the run from the entrance to the gate, and the passport, timing and luggage rules.

7 min read · Last updated October 13, 2026

Transport

Cycling in Shanghai: how shared bikes work, and when not to ride

Shanghai is flat, which makes it a generous city for a bicycle, and enormous and traffic-heavy, which makes it a poor one for a journey. This covers how shared bikes work, the rules visitors get wrong, the ride worth making and the ride to skip.

7 min read · Last updated October 29, 2026

Seasons

Seasons

The best time to visit China, month by month

Season-by-season weather, crowds and prices, which regions peak when, and why the two big 2026 holiday weeks reorganise everything.

6 min read · Last updated September 30, 2026

Food & drink

Food & drink

Benbang vs hangbang: how Shanghai's and Hangzhou's cooking differ

Both repertoires come from Jiangnan and both use soy, sugar and river fish; the difference is that benbang cooks flavour into the ingredient while hangbang keeps the ingredient's own flavour. Technique, sweetness, texture, river fish, defining dishes, and what to order in each city.

7 min read · Last updated October 4, 2026

Food & drink

Shanghai wet markets and cooked-food counters: how locals actually shop

A wet market in Shanghai is a working place for buying dinner, not an attraction: how the stalls are laid out, how the cooked-food counter is bought and kept, how to shop without Chinese, and which markets have turned into food courts.

8 min read · Last updated October 9, 2026

Food & drink

Teahouses and coffee in Shanghai: two ways of sitting down

Shanghai has a real cafe culture and a real teahouse culture, and they occupy different parts of the day and the city: how each one works, how tea is ordered by the pot, which to choose for what, and where it disappoints.

7 min read · Last updated October 27, 2026

Food & drink

Drinks and bars in Shanghai: start with the glass at the table

Visitors assume the bar scene is the story, but it is the youngest of three layers, above an older rice-wine culture and an everyday beer culture, and this guide sorts the three before taking the six kinds of bar, the rooftop trade-off, the way home, and what disappoints.

7 min read · Last updated October 28, 2026

Etiquette

Etiquette

Yu Garden and the old city: garden, bazaar and the lanes around them

Yu Garden is a walled Ming-dynasty garden with an admission ticket; the bazaar wrapped around it is a different thing, free and open all day. Here is how to tell them apart, when to go, where the crowds actually jam, and which lanes outside are worth walking.

7 min read · Last updated October 3, 2026

Etiquette

Choosing a show in Shanghai: five formats, tickets and seats

Shanghai's performance scene is not one market but five different evenings. Here is who each format suits, how tickets are actually bought, how to pick a seat, and which formats most often disappoint.

7 min read · Last updated October 3, 2026

Etiquette

Chinese food and etiquette for visitors

What to eat and where, how to order without Chinese, what dietary needs are realistic, and the etiquette that actually matters.

6 min read · Last updated September 30, 2026

Etiquette

Guangfulin: the Shanghai archaeological site most visitors miss

Guangfulin in Songjiang is a genuinely excavated settlement site turned into a park and exhibition complex, with halls sunk under a lake. Here is what it is, what you actually walk through, whether the archaeology is told well, and which parts are flat.

6 min read · Last updated October 5, 2026

Etiquette

Lu Xun Park and the memorial hall: how to spend half a day in Hongkou

Lu Xun Park in Hongkou, with the memorial hall and his tomb inside it, fills half a day: the park is a working city park, the hall is a memorial display. This covers who Lu Xun was, what is actually inside, how much of it works without Chinese, and how to fold in Duolun Road and Shanyin Road.

7 min read · Last updated October 6, 2026

Etiquette

Wukang Road and the old villas: a walk to take slowly

The Wukang Road area is a garden-villa district laid out in the 1920s and 1930s, and it is still residential. How to walk it north to south, why the Wukang Building cannot be avoided, what else is worth stopping for, and where the reputation and the reality part company.

7 min read · Last updated October 6, 2026

Etiquette

Columbia Circle and Tonglefang: two routes through Shanghai's converted factory sites

Columbia Circle and Tonglefang are two versions of the same Shanghai story: a country club and research institute turned low-rise garden campus, and a lane of small workshops turned small creative quarter. What each one is, how their characters differ, what there is to do, how to join them in an afternoon and an evening, and which expectations will not survive the visit.

7 min read · Last updated October 7, 2026

Etiquette

Nanxiang old town: the birthplace of xiaolongbao, and the town itself

Nanxiang, in Jiading, is one of the few towns on Shanghai's edge that still keeps a real old core: a pair of ancient brick pagodas, a temple and the classical garden Guyi Garden, all within walking distance. It is also where xiaolongbao come from, though the long queue on the old street measures fame. This guide covers what you actually see, how commercialised the street is, whether half a day is enough, how to get there, and what disappoints.

7 min read · Last updated October 8, 2026

Etiquette

Museums and galleries in Shanghai: booking, closing days, and how to plan around them

Shanghai's museums fall into a few kinds: the large municipal museum, specialist collections, contemporary art museums and galleries, private collections, and small displays inside historic buildings. This covers the booking mechanism, the closing pattern to expect, how to spend a day, and which kind suits whom.

7 min read · Last updated October 9, 2026

Etiquette

Shanghai's parks and riverside walks: how to use the free public space

Shanghai's parks and riverside walks are not sights but the free public space locals use daily, and this sorts them by function, explains how to walk the riverside as a route, and covers what happens in a park and how to behave in it.

6 min read · Last updated October 16, 2026

Etiquette

Panlong old town: what is old and what is new

Panlong old town guide: Panlong Tiandi in Qingpu is a water town rebuilt on an old village site, with the old fabric surviving only in fragments. This guide sets out how to tell remnants from rebuilt sections and from entirely new commercial buildings dressed up as old, what the canal, the lanes, the temple and the food each repay, the trade between convenience and authenticity against other water towns, how to get there by direction, how long to allow and when it is busiest, and who should come and who should spend the half day elsewhere.

6 min read · Last updated October 16, 2026

Etiquette

Yunjian Granary: a guide to the silos, the ground and what is programmed inside

Yunjian Granary is a group of 1950s grain depot buildings in Songjiang with water along one side, its silos, warehouses and yards kept in place and filled with exhibitions, shops and food; this guide sets out what is actually there by category, how much is buildings and how much is programming, how to get there, how long to allow, whether to eat on site, and who should come.

7 min read · Last updated October 17, 2026

Etiquette

Shanghai's small theatres and live music rooms: how to find this layer

Below the big shows sits another layer: small theatres, experimental rooms, comedy and improv, jazz and rock venues, the recital halls, and bars that host live music without being music venues. This guide lists no names; it explains why there is no fixed list, how to look, what the rooms are like, and which evenings disappoint.

7 min read · Last updated October 20, 2026

Etiquette

Temples and churches in Shanghai: how to visit, and what to mind

Shanghai's Buddhist temples, its best-known Daoist temple, a Confucian temple, Catholic and Protestant churches, a mosque and a synagogue are all in use, with worshippers inside. This covers how to read a temple's layout, how the kinds differ, the etiquette that matters, and what incense and blessings actually cost.

7 min read · Last updated October 30, 2026

Etiquette

Buying gifts in Shanghai: choosing, boxing, and getting them home

The hard part of a gift from Shanghai is not choosing it but getting it home in one piece and through customs: what travels, why you should ask for the box, what the box costs you, and what makes a gift land here.

7 min read · Last updated October 31, 2026

Etiquette

Museums with children in Shanghai: which kinds work and which do not

Most Shanghai museums are built for adult reading, while a child needs things to look at, touch and set moving; this sorts the venues by kind into what holds a child and what does not, and covers the two practical facts, the two-hour limit and the exit.

7 min read · Last updated October 31, 2026

Health

Health

Running and swimming in Shanghai: where, when and what to expect

Keeping up running and swimming in Shanghai is easier than a visitor expects, but the surface and the hour matter more than they do at home, and this covers where to run by kind of place, the park-running culture, heat and air, public pool rules and hotel pools.

7 min read · Last updated October 28, 2026

Safety

Safety

Health, safety and scams in China

Water and food, insurance, hospitals and pharmacies, emergency numbers, how the common scams work, air quality, altitude and lost passports.

6 min read · Last updated September 30, 2026