China’s rollout of visa-free entry to citizens of dozens of countries has delivered a much-needed boost to inbound tourism – as well as helped to prop up the country’s sluggish economy.
Shanghai experienced a 44.8 percent year-on-year increase in tourism numbers for the January to June period, with the city welcoming 2.6 million foreign visitors, the South China Morning Post reports.
About 1.4 million of them entered via the new policy, a three-fold expansion compared to last year.
Beijing doubled its number of visa-free entries over the same period, while Chengdu, Sichuan Province, saw a 120 percent increase.
James Liang, chairman of the online travel service Ctrip, said he believed China’s inbound tourism “could reach the world’s top tier in 10 or 20 years,” though acknowledged that some bottlenecks still needed to be addressed.
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According to the National Immigration Administration, foreign visitors made 9.2 million inbound trips in the first quarter of 2025 – up 40.2 percent year-on-year. Of these, 71.3 percent were made under visa-free policies.
The rise has reportedly been fuelled by the expanded visa-exemption programme along with transport improvements, simplified payment systems and instant tax refunds for departing visitors.
The central government started loosening its entry policies in late 2023 in a bid to resurrect China’s tourism industry after almost three years of Covid-19 restrictions.
Citizens of 43 countries now have visa-free access to the country for periods of up to 30 days. June saw Latin American countries included for the first time, namely Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Peru and Uruguay.
Citizens of 54 countries, meanwhile, can transit through the mainland for up to 240 hours.
