Frequent Miler's latest team challenge, Million Mile Madness, is happening now! Follow us as Greg, Nick, and Stephen compete to earn 1 Million SAS miles by flying 15 airlines before November 23rd. Who will complete the challenge with the most Speed, Affordability, and Style?
Last Week, as part of the Million Mile Madness challenge, I flew to China twice without a visa. On the first visit, I simply transferred to another flight without leaving the airport. On the second visit, though, I entered China and stayed the night. While I’ll describe both experiences below, the purpose of this post is primarily to cover my experience with actually entering China via a 24 hour Transit without Visa.
In-Airport Transfer: Guangzhou
For my first visit to China last week, I simply transferred from one international flight to another. I flew into Guangzhou on Kenya Airways from Bangkok, and departed a few hours later on China Southern to Hanoi. Since I had no plans to exit the airport, this was easy. I simply followed signs for Transfers and lined up to show my passport and boarding pass for exiting the country. I did hit a bit of a snag because my Vietnam visa hadn’t been set up correctly, but that has nothing to do with entering China. Once I showed them that my Vietnam visa was valid for about 30 more minutes after arrival, they let me through to the international departures area.
24 hour Transit without Visa: Hangzhou
General Info
China allows visa free transit for most international visitors (including Americans) for 24 hours to most Chinese cities, for 72 hours for major Chinese cities, and for 144 hours for a select group of Chinese cities. The primary rules are that you must enter from and depart to different countries outside of China. For example, you can’t originate from Ho Chi Minh Vietnam and then return to Hanoi Vietnam, but you could enter from Ho Chi Minh and then exit to Seoul South Korea (for example). Additionally, once in China, you can’t visit other Chinese provinces during your transit-stay.
Since my stay in Hangzhou was planned for only one night, I only needed a 24 hour transit.
Find the transit without visa desk
When I arrived in the Hangzhou airport, I found a big desk that appeared to be set up for the Transit without Visa process, but no one was there. I expect that the process would have been easier if I had arrived while the desk was staffed.
Find the right arrival/departure card!
In the regular immigration area I was directed to fill out an arrival card. I waited in the very slow immigration line and when I finally made it to the front I was told that I had filled out the wrong card. The correct card had two sections – Arrival, and Departure – with a perforation between them. I filled out the arrival section and was careful to note that the purpose of the visit was “transit”. I was given the departure part of the card to fill out and hand in when leaving the country the next day. With my now correct arrival/departure card in-hand, I returned to the immigration counter.
Taiwan may be problematic
The next issue was that the immigration official didn’t seem to think that Taiwan (my next stop) fulfilled the requirement to exit to a country outside of China. To be clear: Taiwan does qualify, but immigration officials at less popular international airports may not be familiar with all of the rules. In my case, I was flying onward the same day from Taipei to Seoul, South Korea. I showed my boarding documents for onward travel to Seoul and I was good to go. I shouldn’t have been required to show this extra flight, but it smoothed the process so it worked for me. I expect that if you’re transiting through a more popular international airport like Shanghai or Beijing you won’t have any trouble exiting to Taiwan. Otherwise, if your next destination is Taiwan, you may want to try to find official Chinese documentation showing that Taiwan is a valid international destination so that you can present that at immigration.
General tip: Have paper copies ready
Regardless of whether you’re transferring in-airport or exiting the airport for 24 or more hours, I highly recommend arriving with all of your documentation on paper — not just on your phone. This includes:
- The boarding pass you used to get to China
- The boarding pass for departing from China (if you’re not able to get this in advance, at least bring a printout of the ticket confirmation)
- A valid visa for the country you are departing to after China, if needed. For example, US citizens are required to have a visa to enter Vietnam.
Want to learn more about miles and points? Subscribe to email updates or check out our podcast on your favorite podcast platform.
You were having trouble probably because of the “can’t go to a diffent province during transit” rule
The People’s Republic of China considers the Republic of China (Taiwan) as a part of the People’s Republic of China, and therefore, not an international destination. That may be why they wanted to see the departure from Taiwan to South Korea.
In fact, the U.S. does not have an “Embassy” in Taiwan, we have an “American Institute in Taiwan”.
This may also be the reason why the People’s Republic of China is “understanding” of Russia’s invasion of parts of the Ukraine that are of “Russian” heritage. China wants Taiwan under it’s control, either by Taiwan voluntarily becoming part of the People’s Republic of China or by force. China is patiently watching the world’s reaction and will consider this in planning it’s course of action to achieve this goal.
I did this a few years ago in Shanghai as a 144 hour visa free transit to go from New York to Shanghai to Bangkok. I spent a few days in Shanghai so wanted to add some additional information:
-if you leave from the US to China they may not believe you can do a visa free transit. The check in desk at American was going to refuse to let me check in for my flight until I insisted on speaking to a supervisor where I showed them the government website that describes this option
– 100% agree have everything printed out both regarding your hotel stay in China if you have one and proof of your upcoming travel out of China. They looked at EVERYTHING and wanted the address and phone number of my hotel in Shanghai as well as my next flight confirmation and even looked at the info for my hotel in Bangkok.
– be prepared to wait for awhile after you land. I had to wait for over an hour for one person to question just two people in front of me in line about their documents
– you must tell your hotel in China that you are there on a visa free transit, they will register you with the police station (probably to make sure you don’t leave the area you are supposed to stay in). I stayed at the Andaz in Shanghai and they knew what I was talking about; they reported my stay to the authorities and sent them a copy of my passport including the page that was stamped on my arrival to China.
The visa/passport scanning and police registration bit is required at all hotels for all travelers, it’s not anything specific to the visa free transit (and so you shouldn’t need to specify at checkin that you’re transiting without a visa, unless they ask for your visa before finding your entry sticker)
Visa free transit in China has been around since 2016 so I wouldn’t expect to run into issues at checkin at this point, but as with anything there’s always a chance you’ll run into an inexperienced agent.