Land & don't panic.

0. The first 30 seconds after the door opens

You've been awake for 16 hours. Your neck has a new shape.

You shuffle off the plane at Pudong, Beijing Capital or Shenzhen Bao'an, and China hits you all at once: the temperature is 20 degrees off, the announcements are loud, and the English on the signs is doing its best.

Congratulations. You're in.

Now the bad news. In the next 90 minutes you'll make about 12 decisions, and half of them have a wrong answer. Each wrong answer costs roughly 200 RMB and an hour of your life, usually at midnight, usually in front of someone talking very fast in a language you don't speak.

The good news: everyone gets the same 12 decisions. So we wrote down the right answers, in the order you'll hit them.

Think of this chapter as a friend who's done this too many times, texting you from the arrivals hall.

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1. Customs & immigration

1.1 The arrival card

Every foreigner fills one in. Since 20 November 2025 you can do it online before you fly, for free, on the National Immigration Administration's site: s.nia.gov.cn/ArrivalCardFillingPC/ (there's a phone version at s.nia.gov.cn/ArrivalCardFillingPhone/), the NIA 12367 app, or the NIA mini program inside WeChat or Alipay. If you skip that, there's a QR code and self-service kiosks in the immigration hall, and the good old paper card still exists.

Fill it in on the plane, not in the queue. Three boxes trip people up:

• "Address in China." Your hotel's name, district and city, in pinyin. "Hanting Shanghai Hongqiao" works. "Hanting Shanghai" doesn't, because there are dozens of them and the officer knows it.
• "Purpose of visit." Pick one: tourism, business, visiting friends. On a Z visa, write "Work." The only thing that reliably earns you a side room is a purpose that doesn't match your visa.
• "Days of intended stay." A number. "30", not "about a month." It should match your return ticket.

Use the official channels only. The address ends in nia.gov.cn. Lookalike sites charge you a "service fee" for a form that is free.

1.2 The immigration line

There are three lines: Chinese passports, foreign passports, and diplomats and crew. You're in the foreign one. It's the slow one. Budget 30 to 60 minutes at peak.

The officer asks the same three questions everyone gets:

1. Where are you staying? Name your hotel.
2. How long? Same number as your arrival card.
3. Why are you here? Same answer as your visa.

This is not the moment for your best material. Don't volunteer extra information, don't make jokes, don't ask why. Answer, smile, wait.

If your visa and your story don't match, you'll get a 15 minute "interview" in a side room. It almost always ends with you walking out fine. It's just 15 minutes you didn't plan for.

1.3 Fingerprints

Foreigners aged 14 to 70 get fingerprinted on entry. Palm flat, four fingers, then thumb, both hands. If the machine sulks, the officer redoes it. Your prints stay on file, so next time it's usually quicker and you get to feel like a regular.

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2. The SIM question, in 90 seconds

2.1 Everyone: get an eSIM before you fly

This part isn't optional. Install an eSIM (Airalo, Holafly, Nomad) at home, before takeoff. About $10 gets you 5 GB for 7 days, and it switches on the moment your plane touches down.

That gets you maps, Didi, Alipay and messages from minute one, without queueing anywhere. It does not get you a Chinese phone number. Whether you need one is the real question.

2.2 Do you need a Chinese number? It depends on how you travel

A Chinese number makes everything easier. Not having one won't ruin your trip. Here's where it actually matters:

• Food delivery (Meituan, Taobao Instant / Ele.me). The rider calling you is not the problem; you can leave a note, and your hotel's front desk or delivery robot will handle the handoff. The problem is the checkout form. The phone number box only accepts a Chinese number: 11 digits, starting with 1. Type your +44 number and the app tells you, very politely, that your number "is in the wrong format." Your number is fine. You're just in the wrong country.
• Receiving packages. Couriers send the locker pickup code by text to a Chinese number. No number, no code, no package.
• Didi. Works with a foreign number. Sign up at home.
• Sending a package. The courier can register you with your passport.

So ask yourself three questions:

• Staying a long time, or exploring on your own? Get a Chinese SIM.
• A short trip, staying in hotels, sticking to the main sights? The eSIM is enough. The hotel restaurant and the shop downstairs don't care about your number.
• Traveling as a group? One person with a Chinese number is enough. They order the noodles; everyone else pays them back.

2.3 If you want the number, buy it at the airport

Right after customs you'll see the China Mobile, China Unicom and China Telecom counters. Yes, they cost a bit more than shops in town. Buy here anyway.

These are the people who register foreign passports all day long. The shop in town might just shrug at you. Bring your passport, expect a face scan, and budget about 10 minutes. Ask for a tourist plan.

Expect to pay roughly 100 to 250 RMB for 15 to 30 days with plenty of data. Prices change often, so read the board before you hand over your passport. If you can't decide, pick China Unicom. It's the usual choice for foreigners, and its airport staff are the most likely to speak English.

2.4 5G, briefly

Pudong, Hongqiao, Capital and Daxing all have full 5G in the terminal. Downtown in the big cities, 5G. Smaller cities, mostly 4G. The subway, surprisingly, is great. You'll get better signal 30 meters underground than in some London pubs.

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3. Getting out of the airport

3.1 Taxi vs Metro vs Maglev

Route	Time to downtown	Cost (RMB)	When
Official taxi line	35–60 min	150–250	Late at night, heavy bags, zero energy
Metro (Line 2 from Pudong, Airport Express from Capital)	50–75 min	7–25	Daytime, light bags, you actually slept
Maglev (Pudong → Longyang Rd only)	8 min	50	Daytime only (last train around 9:40pm). Once, to say you did it
Didi	30–55 min	100–180	If you set it up before you flew

The last metro out of the airport leaves somewhere between 10pm and 11pm, and the Maglev stops even earlier, around 9:40pm. Landing late? Check the timetable on the plane. After the last train, the taxi line is your only sane option.

3.2 The "fixed price taxi" guys

Outside arrivals, a man in a slightly too large suit will hold up a cardboard sign: "Taxi — fixed price 200 RMB." He is not a taxi. He's a tout with an unlicensed car (黑车, "black car"), and his business model comes in two flavors:

1. The price becomes 300 once you're inside, with the doors locked.
2. He takes the scenic route, then charges 500 "because traffic."

The pitch changes, the trick doesn't. "About the same as Didi" (跟网约车差不多), "no platform fee" (无平台费), or he claims to work for a ride-hailing app. Then the bill arrives at two to four times the fair fare, padded with a "luxury car" upgrade, or a made up parking fee (停车费) or night fee (夜间费) on top of the price he quoted. In cases Shanghai police published in January 2026, a ride from the Hongqiao transport hub that normally costs about 60 RMB was billed 153. Two tourists at Shanghai Disneyland were quoted 130 RMB, then told it was a "luxury ride-hail" and asked for 538. They paid 412. The same tricks work at airports, stations and anywhere tourists queue.

If it happens to you, don't argue in the car. Photograph the plate, pay at your destination, then report it on 12328. If he locks the doors or threatens you, call 110.

The real taxi line has a uniformed dispatcher and a queue of actual taxis. At Pudong it's to the right of arrivals; at Capital, to the left. Join it. The meter runs. Nobody negotiates.

Airports crack down on touts every so often, so on a good night you won't see any. The rule doesn't change: anyone who walks up to you offering a ride is not your ride.

3.3 Didi: set it up at home, not in the arrivals hall

Didi takes foreign phone numbers. Download it before you fly, switch it to English in Settings, and link your card. You can also skip the extra app and use Didi inside Alipay, which you'll set up anyway (Chapter 02). Pickup zones at Pudong and Capital are signposted in English.

Forgot? Don't try to set up a ride-hailing account in the arrivals hall at 1am with 4% battery. Take the official taxi. Do Didi tomorrow, after coffee.

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4. Hotel check-in

4.1 The registration form

Chinese law requires hotels to register every foreign guest with the local police within 24 hours. The front desk photographs your passport and visa page and asks you to sign one form. This is normal. It's not about you; locals get registered too.

Staying with a friend instead? Then you register, at the local police station (派出所) within 24 hours. Bring your passport and visa; it takes 10 minutes. Skip it and you might hear about it on the way out of the country. Don't skip it.

4.2 The WiFi login page

Connect to the hotel WiFi and a login page pops up, often only in Chinese. Usually it wants your room number and last name. Sometimes it wants a phone number and a text code, and some of these pages only accept Chinese numbers. Same format problem as the food apps.

If it rejects your number, or the page makes no sense at all, ask the front desk. They have a printed QR code for exactly this, because you are not the first.

4.3 The phone call at 11pm

In some cheaper business hotels, usually the ones with no English name, the room phone rings 15 minutes after you check in. A voice offers "massage." This is not the hotel spa. Hang up. If it happens again, unplug the phone. It doesn't happen at the big chains.

4.4 The deposit that eats your credit limit

Most hotels in China hold a deposit at check-in, on top of the room. How much depends on the hotel: some hold one night's rate, some hold a fixed amount, and some hold far more than you'd expect. Ask at the desk, "How much is the deposit?", before you hand over your card.

On a foreign card, that hold can take 5 to 10 business days to drop after checkout, and until then it looks like a real charge. If you're traveling on a tight credit limit, this is the thing that bites.

If your card won't take the hold, the desk will ask for a cash deposit in RMB instead. It can sometimes go on Alipay instead, but foreign cards on Alipay add a 3% fee above ¥200 (Chapter 02). Carry enough RMB cash to cover a night or two, for exactly this moment.

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5. First-morning checklist

Jet lag will wake you at 4am. Breakfast is at 6. The city doesn't really start until 9. Use the gap:

1. Get some RMB cash. If your hotel exchanges money (bigger international hotels usually do), change a little at the desk. Otherwise use a bank ATM. Keep it for the rare stall that won't take QR codes (Chapter 02, §6 explains when).
2. Check Alipay works. You set it up at home with your card linked (see the carry-on list below). Make one small payment, a bottle of water will do, to prove it. Full walkthrough in Chapter 02.
3. Install the three apps you'll use today:
   • Didi, for taxis.
   • Dianping (大众点评), for finding food. Menus switch to English in Settings; most reviews stay in Chinese.
   • Amap (高德地图), the map that actually knows where you are. English in Settings → Language.
4. Save your hotel's address in Chinese characters in your notes. Show it to any driver. You will get home.
5. Learn one phrase: 不要香菜 (bú yào xiāng cài), "no cilantro." It turns up in more dishes than you'd guess. If you hate it, this sentence saves you a lot of picking green things out of soup.

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6. The one mistake to NOT make on Day 1

Being ambitious.

Don't book a tour. Don't try to extend your visa. Don't open a bank account, sign a lease, or fight WeChat Pay's foreign card setup in a jet-lagged haze (we'll do that properly in Chapter 02).

Day 1 goals: arrive. Sleep. Eat one good meal. Walk one block. Sleep again.

That's it. China will still be there tomorrow, and so will the noodles.

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Sidebar: what's in your carry-on for Day 1

Your big suitcase might take an hour to show up. These eight things shouldn't be in it:

1. Passport, plus a paper copy of the photo page and your visa. Hotels, SIM counters and police stations all want to see it, and a dead phone can't show a scan.
2. An eSIM, already installed and switched on. Not "I'll do it at the gate."
3. About 1,000 RMB in cash if you can get it at home. For the hotel deposit, the first taxi, and the one stall that only takes cash. Dollars and euros don't help here; nobody takes them.
4. A power bank, charged. QR codes, maps and your boarding pass all live on a phone that's at 11%.
5. Your hotel's address in Chinese characters, screenshotted and written on paper.
6. Alipay, installed and logged in, with your foreign card linked directly. Chapter 02 walks you through it. Do it at home with WiFi and patience.
7. A pen. For the paper arrival card, if you end up with one. Nobody on the plane has a spare.
8. Something to help you sleep, an eye mask or whatever works for you. Day 1's only real job is getting your body onto China time.

— End of Chapter 1