Transport in China

Transport in China is easy as long as you’re prepared. There are multiple ways to get you to where you want to be. Let us share with you what you can prepare for yourself before the trip, and what you can do when you are in China.

Get a Local Number in China

This is optional, but it makes life much much easier in China. A local number allows you to easily sign up for accounts in Apps, and to verify your accounts across apps, making many things one-click away.

For example, I first had my Alipay and WeChat account set up and verified for payment. Thereafter, whenever I attempt to sign up for an account on other apps like Hello App (for bicycles) and Meituan (Food Delivery), I can easily click “Signup with 1 Button”, and select the China phone number. They will then be able to sign me up right away.

Without a local phone number, you won’t be able to sign up for an account on Meituan, and would have to ask

Prepare the Apps

Baidu Maps

This is the go-to map to use when you’re in China, if you speak Chinese or if you’re feeling adventurous. If you don’t, Apple map works as well.

Payment Apps

Both options below works, and both should be prepared. While both works, I felt that Alipay had better user experience, but certain regions only accept Wechat.

Find out more about the payment apps here[link to payment article]!

Travel Across Regions

When travelling across provinces, there are two major transportation methods, the plane and the train.

For very long distances, you would want to still be traveling by plane just to save time (and money in some cases). As a reference, any train services that take more than 5 hours would be better via the plane, considering both comfort and cost.

Something to note for both transport options, is that security is very strict for both. Even more for taking the plane. I suggest to add at least 30mins to your journey to avoid a stressful travel.

Plane

China is huge. Massively huge. So it’s inevitable that some trips from the west to east will require a plane.

There are some things to note about taking domestic flights in China. Firstly, the counter check-ins are quite slow, and security is stricter than other airports I have been to. This means that you will likely have to allow for more time at the airport than you usually would.

Check-in lines could move quite slowly

Foreigners can’t use the automated check-in counters at some airports, so we have to go through the manual check-in counters. And the check-in counters queues are usually long and slow, as there are bigger groups, and or people with huge and many luggages to put through.

When we were there, we usually spent at least 20minutes at the check-in counter at the queue, and about 3 minutes for ourselves.

At a few airports, I saw some staff carrying a board that says “Are you running late? Let me know”, that if you approach them, they could help you skip queues and board you ASAP. However, I wouldn’t place my bet on it, and would rather arrive early, get everything done ahead of time, and enjoy the rest of the wait with a peace of mind.

Security is really strict

Checking in to departure will take some time. Every single traveller will go through a full body check, on top of the usual bag checks.

For the body checks, each line will always have a male and female inspector, and they will check the traveller of the same gender. They do it deep. They really scan your full body by grabbing any areas where weapons could be hidden, down to the insides of my socks. On one occasion, I was also asked to remove my shoes so that they can be scanned. In my experience, they are very thorough, but also polite throughout.

As for the bag checks, the Chinese airports are stricter than others as well. They require us to remove umbrellas, any wires, and all lithium batteries too, on top of laptop. I had to unpack my whole backpack in which I keep my laptop, ipad, chargers, portable chargers, and my drone. I would re-pack my bag after the scan. The first time felt really hectic for me, but the second time on, I was much cooler and relaxed, already knowing the protocols and the requirements.

Trains

In China, do not dismiss the train as a cheap and low-class travel method! In fact, the train stations are often as well-equipped as an airport terminal. On top of that, the cheapest seats of the trains are mostly more comfortable than the plane’s cheapest. And the trains in China are the mostly punctual transportation ever. If the train is scheduled to leave by 2pm, you better be boarded the train by 1:55pm!

On top of that, many train stations are located nearer the city centre than airports are, thus allowing you to get to your endpoint location faster.

Taking the train in China is also rather easy as a foreigner. You mostly require just your passport.

Check out this detailed guide to taking the train in China.

Buying Tickets for Flight and Trains

Trip.com is a good channel to get both your flight and train tickets within China. Because it’s Chinese owned, many steps are made more convenient for the end users. For example, for train tickets, you can easily show the “ticket collection number” page to the staff, and they will be able to print the ticket for you.

Travel within the City

Metro

Price : 2 RMB per trip (within city), up to 10RMB for long trips (from airport to city)

Best for : Medium distances. eg. Within the city, for distances more than 1.5km.

For medium distances, if the city has such an option, the metro is your best bet. It will bring you where you need to in the quickest way, for an affordable price. The rate of transport is about 2RMB per trip within the city, and up to 5 or 10RMB from the airport to the city.

Bus

Price : 1 RMB per trip.

Best for : Medium distances where your location and destination are connected via a bus route.

Buses are cheap and faster than walking, but they are susceptible to adverse traffic conditions, and could also be very crowded. They also often do not lie in the path between my accommodation and my destination.

My advice is to take the bus only if the destination and your location are suitably connected. Otherwise, opt for the metro, or ride a bicycle.

Note: Some cities like Urumqi only has 1 metro line, which means there are many areas in the city that is not served by metro. They also do not provide the bicycle option (see below), meaning the need to take the bus is higher in such cities. I took the bus far more often than I did in any other cities.

E-scooter

Price : 20-40RMB per day, depends on distance.

Best for : hilly towns or cities.

Some cities provide electric scooter rental at an affordable price. These scooters do not require any license, but are mechanically adjust such that the maximum speed in 25km/h. You would operate it like it’s a faster bicycle, or a slower scooter. Ride in the bicycle lane, but make left turns as a real scooter would.

This is one of the most convenient and fast methods of transport for a foreigner, but I have to admit that it does require some adventurous gut.

Bicycle/E-bicycle

Price : Starts from about 1.5RMB, up to 5RMB.

Best for : Short and up to medium distances.

In cities like Chengdu and Shanghai, bicycles are EVERYWHERE along the streets. In Kunming, E-bicycles are EVERYWHERE along the streets.

They are also very easy to rent, so they were my staple of transport when I was in these mega cities.

There are 3 companies providing the services, and so there are 3 apps.

  • Hello (Integrated with AliPay App)

  • Meituan (Integrated with Meituan App)

  • Didi

In my 30 days, I only used Hello because that was the easiest to get verified. Meituan somehow required me to fill in my passport details which was a little troublesome, and Didi just didn’t have the option for me to select the option of using passport to do verification.

Even though I only managed to use the blue bicycles, there were more than sufficient blue bicycles around, so I never really have to go more than 2 blocks to find a blue bicycle.

Unfortunately, not everything was great. We had some issues with some bicycles when we were in Shanghai. Some bicycles were hardly usable, and we had to return and scan another bicycle nearby. The rate of poorly serviced bicycles in Shanghai was much higher than the other cities that we went to. The good thing is that if you cancel the rental of a bicycle nearby from where you started, the app will ask if you met any issues with the bicycle you just rented, and it will cost nothing when you end the rental.

Lastly, if you are planning to ride bicycles for more than once a day, I recommend downloading the Hello app directly, as they have some discount vouchers in the app. Some of the vouchers go at like a low cost of maybe 5rmb, and you get unlimited access to the bicycles for either a few days, or up to a week or a month.

Walking

Yes, walking is also a viable and reliable mode of transportation in China, because of good walkway pavement infrastructure. In most parts of China that we visited, walking is comfortable on pavements made for walking.

For distances within 1.5 kilometres, walking would be the fastest second to the bicycle, unless there is a frequent bus service that runs right along the path you would take.

The other less often discussed advantage of walking is the amount of calorie you would burn over the day if you walked. The more you walk, the more food you can try in China 😉

Didi

Once in awhile, when you’re tired from all the walking and cycling, you can also considering private hires. In China, that would be Didi. Download the app, and it works pretty much like Uber or Grab or their equivalent, except it’s not very expensive getting a private hire ride like Didi in China, compared to other developed countries like Japan and Singapore.

One thing for Didi, when you board the car, the drivers would usually confirm your identity with you. In my case, it was the last four digits of my phone number, as that was the ID i used to link the Didi account.

Lastly, please note that Didi is not always the fastest option. The road and traffic conditions could make it such that taking metro or riding the bicycle might end up being faster and more comfortable than getting stuck in a car during peak period traffic.