How to pay for things in China

Why the answer is not "just use your card"

China skipped the credit card era. Where Australia went cash to card to phone, China went cash to phone, and the card layer in between never really arrived. That leaves a country where a QR code is accepted by a woman selling fruit from a bicycle and a Visa card is not accepted by the restaurant next door.

This caught a lot of visitors out when the country reopened, and both major payment platforms responded by making it much easier for foreigners to use them. The situation now is genuinely fine — but only if you have set it up.

Mobile payments, which is what almost everyone uses

Both Alipay and WeChat Pay let visitors link an international card. You verify with your passport and a face scan in the app. You do not need a Chinese bank account or a Chinese phone number.

Either one works. Alipay is generally the easier of the two for visitors, because WeChat is primarily a messaging app with payments attached and its interface assumes you already live there. Some people set up both, on the reasoning that a phone with one working payment app is a phone with a single point of failure.

On fees. Small transactions are free — under roughly ¥200 there is no cross-border platform fee. Above that, expect a percentage fee of around three per cent on top of whatever your own bank charges for foreign currency. Check your card's foreign transaction fee before you decide which card to link; the difference between a travel card and a standard credit card is more than the platform fee.

On limits. Visitors linking international cards have a per-transaction ceiling and an annual one, and both were raised substantially in 2024 — they are now high enough that ordinary holiday spending will not reach them. What can catch people is a lower limit imposed by their own bank, or an automated fraud block on the first transaction. That is the practical risk, not the official cap.

Do the setup at home. Verification sometimes needs a working internet connection to services that are easier to reach from Australia, and if something goes wrong you want it to go wrong while you can still ring your bank at a reasonable hour.

Cash still works, and is worth carrying

Refusing cash is not legal in China, and the central bank has penalised businesses for it. Rules on this were tightened again in early 2026. In practice, hotels, supermarkets, chain restaurants and taxis will take notes without difficulty.

The complication is at the other end of the scale. A small vendor who has not handled paper money in years may genuinely not have change for a ¥100 note. Carry smaller denominations — ¥10s and ¥20s — and think of cash as your fallback rather than your primary method.

A few hundred yuan is enough. You are covering the gap between arriving and getting a payment app working, plus the occasional stall.

Where your physical card actually works

The pattern is that international-facing businesses take cards and domestic ones do not. Once you leave the big cities, assume no.

Four other things worth setting up before you fly

Connectivity. International roaming works, and so do travel eSIMs. Whichever you choose, activate and test it before you leave Australia rather than in the arrivals hall. Some apps and services you use daily at home are not available on the Chinese internet, so download offline maps and anything else you rely on in advance.

Maps. Google Maps is not usable in China in the way you expect. Apple Maps works. Amap and Baidu Maps are what everyone actually uses, and Amap has a usable English mode. Have something downloaded before you land.

Your ride-hailing option. Didi is the equivalent of Uber and has an English interface. It is markedly easier than explaining a destination to a taxi driver, and it settles the fare through the app.

Screenshots of the essentials. Your hotel name and address in Chinese characters, your booking references, and your return flight details. A screenshot works when the network does not.

The registration rule nobody mentions

Every foreign visitor must have their accommodation registered with the local police, generally within 24 hours of arrival. If you are staying in hotels this happens automatically — the front desk scans your passport at check-in and files it. You do nothing.

It becomes your responsibility only if you stay somewhere that is not a licensed hotel: a friend's apartment, a family member's home, or a short-term rental. In that case the registration has to be done at the local police station, usually by you and your host together.

There is a related point that matters when hotels are being chosen. Not every Chinese hotel is licensed to accept foreign passport holders, and the ones that are not will turn you away at the desk regardless of the booking you hold. This is more common with domestic budget chains and in smaller cities than in Beijing or Shanghai.

What I do about this before you travel

I confirm that every property on an itinerary is licensed to accept foreign guests before it is booked, rather than assuming it. I send a short pre-departure note covering payment setup, connectivity and the apps worth having, because the trips that start badly usually start badly at the airport rather than at the hotel.

Fora's advisor training and supplier network are where a lot of this ground knowledge comes from, and where I go to verify a property's current situation rather than relying on what was true last year.

The honest caveat

This is the area of China travel that changes fastest. Payment limits, fees and app requirements have all moved more than once in the past two years, and anything you read on this subject that is not dated should be treated with suspicion — including this page, which is why it carries one.

I re-check the current position close to each departure rather than handing over a document written months earlier.