China Step by StepPractical intelligence

Accommodation registration

Foreign visitors staying in mainland China are registered with local public security. In a hotel the hotel does it for you, and it hands back a document: a Registration Form of Temporary Residence carrying the address and the hotel’s stamp, which Romania’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs describes as the proof that the registration happened and says is repeated on every trip to China. In non-hotel accommodation — a rented apartment, a friend or relative’s home — the guest or the host must register instead. An online route for that non-hotel registration opened on 20 March 2026, but only as a pilot in seven named regions. The deadline is 24 hours, and that is where this page has to be careful, because the two governments involved do not start the clock at the same moment.

Should I do it before China?

No — this belongs after you land

Registration is attached to the address you actually sleep at, so none of it can be filed before you fly. The part that is worth settling in advance is which kind of accommodation you booked: a hotel registers you, while non-hotel accommodation puts a 24-hour deadline on you or your host. Booking a hotel for the first night is therefore a way of buying yourself out of the deadline on the day you are most jet-lagged, and if you are staying with friends or in a rented flat, the second thing to settle before departure is who is going to walk to the police station — you or the host — because the source makes it either of you and neither is a default.

How

  1. Do before arrivalWork out, for each booking, whether it is a hotel or non-hotel accommodation, because that decides who carries the registration duty.1
  2. Can do in ChinaIn a hotel, nothing is required from you: hotels register foreign guests.1
  3. Can do in ChinaIn non-hotel accommodation, you or your host must register with local public security within 24 hours. Plan that window from the moment you entered China, which is the stricter of the two official readings and the one this page works to; the National Immigration Administration’s own wording counts it from arrival at the accommodation, and the step below sets out why the two differ.1
  4. Can do in ChinaIn Hebei, Liaoning, Zhejiang, Hubei, Guangxi, Chongqing or Sichuan, the online pilot has been running since 20 March 2026, and the National Immigration Administration’s own page says the initial registration should be completed with the host’s assistance.2
  5. Can do in ChinaCount the 24 hours from entering China, not from checking in — and understand why this page says so. Two official sources phrase the same deadline differently. Romania’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs states it as 24 hours from entering the country; the Chinese Exit and Entry Administration Law, at Article 39, sets it as 24 hours from moving into non-hotel accommodation. Those are not the same clock: a traveller who lands in the morning and reaches a rented flat the following afternoon has already used the Romanian reading up. This site’s rule for a disagreement between two official sources is to act on the stricter one and print both, so plan against the Romanian wording and keep the Chinese one in view.3
  6. Can do in ChinaAsk the hotel front desk for a copy of the registration form and keep it with the passport — that instruction is the fallback recorded against this record rather than a line in the source. What the source does say is that the Registration Form of Temporary Residence, the one carrying the address and the hotel’s stamp, is the proof of registration, and that the procedure repeats on every trip to China rather than carrying over from a previous visit.3
  7. Can do in ChinaKeep the passport itself on you while you are doing all of this. Article 38 of the same law requires foreigners aged 16 or over staying in China to carry the passport, another international travel document, or a stay or residence permit, and to submit it for inspection by public security organs — and it is the document the registration is made against in the first place.4
  8. Can do in ChinaDo not plan to substitute a photocopy. Here too the two governments differ: Romania’s MFA tells its citizens to keep the passport or a copy of it on them, because police may carry out random checks and being unable to prove identity can be punished by a fine or detention, while Chinese law itself requires the document and does not establish a copy as a legal substitute. Carry the original and keep an offline photo of the data page as well, for hotel desks and forms rather than for inspections.5

What can go wrong

You stay in a rented apartment and assume the platform or the landlord has already registered you.

What to do instead Hotels are the ones stated to register guests. In non-hotel accommodation the duty is on the guest or the host, within 24 hours — measured from entry into China, which is the stricter of the two official readings this page holds and the one to plan against. The National Immigration Administration’s own wording measures it from arrival at the accommodation.1

You plan to do the registration online wherever you happen to be in China.

What to do instead The online service is a pilot in Hebei, Liaoning, Zhejiang, Hubei, Guangxi, Chongqing and Sichuan. This source does not establish nationwide availability, so elsewhere register with local public security.2

You land late and decide the registration can wait until the next convenient day.

What to do instead The window is 24 hours, not 24 hours from whenever you get round to it. Work it from the moment you entered China — the stricter of the two official readings — rather than from the moment you dropped your bags, which is how the National Immigration Administration words the same deadline.1

You read the 24-hour rule as starting when you drop your bags, and your journey from the border to the flat takes most of a day.

What to do instead Then the two official readings give you two different deadlines, and only one of them is still open. Romania’s MFA measures the 24 hours from entering the country; Article 39 of the Chinese Exit and Entry Administration Law measures them from moving into the non-hotel accommodation. Work to the Romanian wording, which is the stricter of the two, and register on the day you arrive in the country.3

You are asked to show that you were registered and the hotel checked you out days ago.

What to do instead The document to ask for at the time is the Registration Form of Temporary Residence with the address and the hotel’s stamp, which is what the registration proof actually is. The recorded fallback is to ask the front desk for a copy and keep it with the passport; the procedure runs again on the next trip, so there is nothing to carry forward from last time.3

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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