China's 240-hour visa-free transit, decoded

China’s transit visa-free scheme used to top out at 144 hours. Since 17 December 2024 it’s been a single, far more generous category: 240 hours — ten days — and the rules changed enough that most of the old blog posts you’ll find are now wrong. This page covers what the 240-hour transit visa-free policy actually is, who’s eligible, which ports and cities it covers, and the handful of rules that get people turned away at check-in. The checker above runs your specific trip against all of them.

What the 240-hour transit visa-free scheme actually is

It lets eligible travelers enter mainland China without a visa for up to 240 hours (10 days) while transiting to a third country or region. It replaced the old 72-hour and 144-hour transit windows — those numbers no longer exist; both were merged and extended to 240 hours.

“The duration of stay for foreign nationals in transit will be extended from the original 72 hours and 144 hours to 240 hours.” — National Immigration Administration of China

The key word is transit. This is not the same thing as the 30-day visa-free scheme that covers tourists from 50 countries — that one needs no onward ticket and lets you roam almost the whole country. If your nationality is on the 30-day list, use that instead; it’s simpler and gives you three times the stay. The 240-hour transit is for everyone else, and the most-searched example is US citizens, who are not on the 30-day list but are eligible for 240-hour transit.

Do you qualify? The five tests, in plain terms

Every refusal comes down to failing one of five tests. The checker above walks through them; here’s what each one means:

1. Nationality — your passport must be on the 55-country transit list.
2. Third country — you must be flying onward to a different country or region than the one you arrived from.
3. Entry port — you must enter through one of the ~60 designated ports.
4. Stay area — your trip must stay inside the 24 provinces the scheme covers.
5. The clock — you must leave within 240 hours, counted from 00:00 the day after you land.

Which countries are eligible: the 55-nationality list

As of June 2026, 55 countries qualify. The scheme launched with 54 on 17 December 2024; Indonesia was added on 12 June 2025. The list is heavily European, but it also includes the United States, Canada, Brazil, Japan, South Korea, Australia and the Gulf states:

• Europe (40): Albania, Austria, Belarus, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czechia, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Monaco, Montenegro, Netherlands, North Macedonia, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Ukraine, United Kingdom.
• Americas (6): Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Mexico, United States.
• Asia & Oceania (9): Australia, Brunei, Indonesia, Japan, New Zealand, Qatar, Singapore, South Korea, United Arab Emirates.

If your country isn’t on this list, 240-hour transit isn’t an option — you need a regular visa. Because the list is revised several times a year, confirm yours on the official NIA site before booking; one outdated list is worse than none.

The third-country rule — the #1 reason people get refused

This is what trips up transit travelers most. The scheme requires onward travel to a third country or region — not a return to where you came from.

Flying London → Beijing → London does not qualify. London → Beijing → Tokyo does. The official test looks only at two segments: the last leg into China and the next leg out of China — those two places must belong to different countries or regions. Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan count as separate “regions” for this purpose, so Seoul → Shanghai → Hong Kong works.

Airlines verify this at check-in before you fly, so a round-trip ticket to the same country can get you denied boarding before you ever reach China. You must hold a confirmed onward ticket with a date and seat — air, rail or sea — to that third country.

How the 240-hour clock works — you get more than ten days

A detail that quietly hands you an extra partial day: the stay is counted from 00:00 on the day after you enter, not from the moment you clear immigration.

The official example: enter through Guangzhou on 1 January, and your 240 hours start at 00:00 on 2 January. So if you land at 3pm, that whole first afternoon and evening are effectively free — plan your onward departure off the official count, not your arrival time. The checker uses your two dates to flag anything over the limit.

Which ports you can enter through

The scheme runs through 60 designated ports across 24 provinces and municipalities — up from 39 ports and 19 provinces under the old rules. The 2024 expansion added 21 ports and five new provinces (Shanxi, Anhui, Jiangxi, Hainan, Guizhou).

Your entry port and exit port can be different — fly into Shanghai, out of Chengdu, no problem, as long as both are designated. The big hubs travelers actually use are all covered: Beijing (Capital and Daxing), Shanghai (Pudong and Hongqiao), Guangzhou Baiyun, Chengdu, Xi’an, Chongqing, Hangzhou, Kunming, Xiamen, Qingdao, Harbin and more. The checker flags whether your entry city is a known designated port.

Where you can travel — and the regions that are off-limits

The single biggest improvement in 2024 was movement: you can now cross provincial lines within the covered area, where the old policy often pinned you to one city or province. You can run a genuine multi-city itinerary — Beijing, Xi’an and Shanghai in one transit, for example.

But seven regions are not covered:

Covered (sample)	Not covered
Beijing, Shanghai, Xi’an, Chengdu, Chongqing, Guilin, Hangzhou, Guangzhou, Kunming, Harbin, Zhangjiajie	Tibet, Xinjiang, Gansu, Qinghai, Ningxia, Inner Mongolia, Jilin

If your trip centers on Tibet or Xinjiang, transit visa-free won’t cover it — and Tibet needs extra permits on top of a visa. A few provinces are covered only in designated cities (for example, Heilongjiang via Harbin; Yunnan via Kunming, Lijiang and Dali). When your destination isn’t an obvious major city, confirm it sits inside the area before you commit.

240-hour transit vs 30-day visa-free: which one is yours

People constantly mix these up, and picking the wrong door is how you get turned away. They are separate schemes with separate rules:

	30-day visa-free	240-hour transit
Who’s eligible	50 countries	55 countries (incl. US)
Max stay	30 days	10 days (240 hours)
Onward ticket to a 3rd country	Not required	Required
Where you can go	Most of the mainland	24 provinces (7 regions excluded)
Main purpose	Tourism, business, family, transit	Transit

The rule of thumb: if you’re on the 30-day list, use it. Only fall back to 240-hour transit if your nationality isn’t covered, or you genuinely only need a short stop on the way somewhere else.

What you must show at the border

Visa-free doesn’t mean question-free. Apply for the temporary entry permit at the border — there’s no advance application and no fee — but have these ready:

• A passport valid for at least three months.
• Your confirmed onward ticket to the third country (the thing officers and airlines actually check).
• A hotel booking or an address for your first night.
• Your digital arrival card QR — since 20 November 2025, nearly every foreign visitor, transit included, must file it online before arrival. See how to fill in the China arrival card.

Transit travelers get checked a little harder than 30-day visa-free arrivals. The two things that actually cause problems: a vague “visiting friends” with no address to give, and an onward ticket that loops back to your home country. Keep your answers concrete and you’ll rarely be held up.

Common ways people get refused — and how to avoid them

• No onward ticket booked. You need a dated, seated ticket to the third country before you reach the border. A loose plan won’t do.
• Round-trip to the same country. The most common single mistake — see the third-country rule above.
• Miscounting the clock. Remember it starts at midnight after you land, but don’t push it; overstaying can mean fines up to 10,000 yuan and a possible re-entry ban.
• Straying into an excluded region. A side trip to Tibet, Xinjiang or one of the other five regions breaks your status.
• Skipping hotel registration. If you don’t stay in a hotel (which registers you automatically), you must register your address at the local police station within 24 hours.

After you’re in: arrival card and registration

Two practical steps close the loop. First, file the digital arrival card before you fly — it’s now mandatory and the QR is the first thing you’ll show. Second, if you’re not in a hotel, handle the 24-hour police registration. Beyond that, the day-to-day is the same as any China trip: you’ll want a working connection from the moment you land, since the apps you rely on are blocked. Our China eSIM guide covers getting online without fighting the firewall.

Sources

• National Immigration Administration of China — announcement on the 240-hour transit policy (official)
• National Immigration Administration — English portal
• Embassy of the PRC in the United States — 240-hour transit conditions (official)
• Consulate-General of the PRC in Montréal — 240-hour transit FAQ, with the clock and third-country examples (official)
• Shanghai Municipal Government — Indonesia added to the list, 12 June 2025 (official)