China Step by StepPractical intelligence

Internet in China

There are four usual routes to a working connection in mainland China: international roaming on your home operator, a travel eSIM bought and installed before you fly, a local Chinese SIM bought in person against your passport after you land, and hotel or public wi-fi. That four-way list is our own summary of the sourced records below rather than a single official statement. Underneath it sits the question most first-time visitors actually have, which is whether a Chinese phone number is required at all: for getting data onto your phone it is not, and for several named services an official page says an international number or an email address is enough — but the answer is not uniform across services, and for one major one it is not established at all.

Should I do it before China?

Yes — finish this before you fly

Almost everything that makes your first hour survivable is set up at home. A travel eSIM needs a working connection to install, and its provider explicitly says it can be installed in advance while you are still outside the coverage area. Apps you may need might not be downloadable from the mainland app store once you are there. Public wi-fi is the one thing that cannot be relied on to bridge the gap, because venues in China verify the identity of users and the common method is a phone number plus an SMS code. Only the Chinese SIM itself has to wait, because it is registered in person against your passport.

How

  1. Do before arrivalDecide your data route before you fly and have at least one of them live on landing: roaming confirmed as switched on in your home operator account, or a travel eSIM already installed. Hotel and public wi-fi are a fourth route but not a first-hour one.1
  2. Do before arrivalIf you go the eSIM route, buy and install it while you still have a connection at home. Airalo states that installing an eSIM requires an available network connection, and that it can be installed in advance before you enter the coverage area so that you are online as soon as you land.2
  3. Do before arrivalInstall and sign in to every app you expect to need from your own country’s app store first. In April 2024 several technology outlets reported that Apple removed WhatsApp, Threads, Telegram and Signal from the mainland China App Store, with Apple stating that the Cyberspace Administration of China had ordered the removal over national security concerns. That is a media account of an Apple statement rather than an Apple page, and the position in 2026 has not been re-checked here.3
  4. Do before arrivalAssume Google Search, Gmail, Google Maps, Google Drive and YouTube may not work and prepare offline: save your flight, hotel, insurance and visa confirmations as local PDFs or screenshots on the phone, download offline maps and an offline translation pack, and have a non-Gmail address you can still reach. We could not retrieve any official source, from Google or from a Chinese authority, stating what is and is not reachable, so treat this as "prepare for it possibly not working" rather than a settled fact. This site does not describe ways around network controls.4
  5. Do before arrivalAgree a backup contact channel with the people at home before you leave, and do not let WhatsApp, Instagram or Facebook be the only way anyone can reach you. The same caveat applies: no official source states their availability, so this is our inference and not a verified fact. Keep the hotel’s phone number and its Chinese-language address as a local screenshot.5
  6. Do before arrivalFor payments, the strongest published statement is WeChat’s: the WeChat Help Center says Weixin Pay can be set up with a passport and that a mainland China (+86) number is not required, as long as your international number can receive SMS codes. Passport-based verification also prompts you to upload a copy of the passport, which is easier to do on home wi-fi than in an arrivals hall.6
  7. Do before arrivalAlipay is where the answer stops being settled. Ant International’s announcement says visitors can bind Mastercard, Visa, JCB, Discover and Diners Club International cards and use local Alipay services without a mainland China bank account or phone number, but an announcement describes an intended capability rather than a tested guarantee, and it does not state which identity document is required.7
  8. Do before arrivalTreat the Alipay verification flow as unverified. No first-party Alipay help page describing passport-based real-name verification for international users could be retrieved on 14 September 2026 — candidate URLs returned 403 errors, expired forms or developer documentation — so the step-by-step lists circulating elsewhere come only from third-party guides. Use the in-app help rather than a step list nobody can stand behind.8
  9. Do before arrivalIf trains are in your plan, register the 12306 account before you fly. Beijing’s Foreign Affairs Office guidance says foreign passengers register with the passport document type and may give either an email address or a phone number, but the phone numbers it accepts are those of the Chinese mainland, Hong Kong, Macao or Taiwan — so a number issued anywhere else falls outside that list, while registering with an email address goes around the restriction entirely. Verification normally takes three to five working days, which is why this cannot wait until you land.9
  10. Do before arrivalFor ride-hailing, the 2025 official guidance for foreign business travellers states that the mainland DiDi app supports registration with a foreign phone number and a foreign bank card. The app you want is the mainland one, not the DiDi-Rider app sold in overseas markets.10
  11. Can do in ChinaOn arrival, do not default to queueing for a Chinese SIM. For a short trip the workable combination is roaming or a travel eSIM for data while keeping your home number reachable for SMS codes; go and buy a local SIM only once you hit a situation that genuinely needs a Chinese number.11
  12. Can do in ChinaExpect public wi-fi to ask who you are. Venues offering wi-fi to the public — hotels, airports, railway stations, cafes, malls, hospitals, schools — are required to implement real-identity verification of users, and the common implementations are a mobile number with an SMS code, or WeChat. Whether a given venue accepts a foreign number for that code is not documented anywhere official. Hotels often simply hand you a room number and password at the desk.12

What can go wrong

You land with no connectivity arranged, so at the airport you cannot look anything up, cannot order a car and cannot contact the hotel.

What to do instead Have one route live before wheels-down: roaming confirmed as activated in your operator account, or a travel eSIM already installed, as the floor under your first hour.1

You plan to use the free airport wi-fi to buy and install an eSIM, and the login page asks for a Chinese mobile number and an SMS code.

What to do instead Do not treat public wi-fi as the first-hour plan. Install the eSIM or enable roaming before departure; at the airport, the alternative is a carrier counter rather than the wi-fi portal.12

Google Maps is your only navigation app and Gmail is the only place your flight and hotel confirmations exist.

What to do instead Save those confirmations offline as PDFs or screenshots before you fly, download offline maps and translation, and keep a second, non-Gmail address. Our navigation guidance sits on the Maps pages.4

Your family only ever contacts you on WhatsApp, and the hotel gave you a WhatsApp number as its only contact detail.

What to do instead Agree an alternative channel with your family before departure — SMS, a phone call, email or WeChat — and store the hotel’s telephone number and Chinese address as an offline screenshot.5

You believe nothing will work without a Chinese number, so you spend an hour or two of landing day queueing for a SIM card you may never need.

What to do instead Data does not need a Chinese number, and 12306 is verified as registrable by email. Start with roaming or a travel eSIM plus your home number for SMS, and only go to a carrier store if a specific service actually blocks you.11

You read that a Chinese number is not needed and assume this is settled for every service, Alipay included.

What to do instead It is settled where an official page says so — WeChat publishes it in its help centre, 12306 accepts email registration, and the official guidance says DiDi takes a foreign number. For Alipay the only statement found is an announcement, and no first-party help page could be retrieved, so carry a second payment path rather than assuming.8

Last verified and sources

Each record below is shown as provenance: who published it, what kind of document it is, how far it reaches and when we last checked it. The source’s own wording is not reproduced here — most of these documents are published in Chinese, and a translation of ours would be a paraphrase standing where a citation should be. Follow the link to read any of them in the original.

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