China signalled a fresh push to court international visitors on 9 December when Culture and Tourism Minister Sun Yeli told state media that the forthcoming 15th Five-Year Plan (2026-2030) will make “convenience” the watch-word for every stage of an overseas traveller’s journey .
According to Sun, the blueprint instructs agencies to expand digital visa filing, tax-refund and payment options, and to keep adding ports to the 240-hour visa-free-transit scheme, which already covers 65 airports, rail and land checkpoints. New “inbound-tourism consumption clusters” will be created in core cities and resort areas; the ministry will curate themed itineraries aimed at high-spending segments such as meetings and incentives, winter sports and heritage tours.
![China sets five-year plan to streamline visas and boost inbound tourism]()
Visa access remains central. China now has mutual visa-exemption treaties with 29 countries and grants unilateral 30-day visa-free entry to nationals of 48 more . Officials hinted that additional European and Latin-American markets are being studied, and that the successful November rollout of the nationwide online Arrival Card—allowing foreigners to pre-file entry data and present a QR code at immigration—will be upgraded with multilingual support and integration into airlines’ mobile apps.
For businesses, easier short-stay entry could reduce lead-times for client meetings and after-sales service calls and may help multinationals persuade risk-averse staff to resume travel to China. Destination managers welcome the rhetoric but say practical hurdles—such as cross-border e-payments and foreign-language customer service—must fall in line with policy.
Travel advisers recommend that companies review their mobility policies now: the expanded visa-free-transit map opens up hub options such as Guangzhou and West Kowloon station for multi-city itineraries, while the arrival-card QR system can be embedded into traveller-tracking apps to cut airport dwell time.
According to Sun, the blueprint instructs agencies to expand digital visa filing, tax-refund and payment options, and to keep adding ports to the 240-hour visa-free-transit scheme, which already covers 65 airports, rail and land checkpoints. New “inbound-tourism consumption clusters” will be created in core cities and resort areas; the ministry will curate themed itineraries aimed at high-spending segments such as meetings and incentives, winter sports and heritage tours.
Visa access remains central. China now has mutual visa-exemption treaties with 29 countries and grants unilateral 30-day visa-free entry to nationals of 48 more . Officials hinted that additional European and Latin-American markets are being studied, and that the successful November rollout of the nationwide online Arrival Card—allowing foreigners to pre-file entry data and present a QR code at immigration—will be upgraded with multilingual support and integration into airlines’ mobile apps.
For businesses, easier short-stay entry could reduce lead-times for client meetings and after-sales service calls and may help multinationals persuade risk-averse staff to resume travel to China. Destination managers welcome the rhetoric but say practical hurdles—such as cross-border e-payments and foreign-language customer service—must fall in line with policy.
Travel advisers recommend that companies review their mobility policies now: the expanded visa-free-transit map opens up hub options such as Guangzhou and West Kowloon station for multi-city itineraries, while the arrival-card QR system can be embedded into traveller-tracking apps to cut airport dwell time.
