Apps You Will Need for China
Apps You Should Install for Travel to China
Alipay
The mother of all apps for travel in China is Alipay. Alipay lets you pay for things, but in addition it has most of the apps below embedded as “mini apps”. From within Alipay you can book rides and taxis with the Didi mini app (Didi is the Chinese equivalent of Uber), book hotels with the Trip mini app, rent bikes, book train tickets with Trip or 12306 mini app and pay for subway/metro tickets.
Note: For Alipay, when making payments, it’s best to turn off your vpn if you have one installed.
A tip for using Alipay: Your foreign credit card may try to send you a confirmation code, which you won’t receive in China. I advise getting a Wise credit card, as it is meant for travelling and the Wise card is less likely to trigger a confirmation code. Even if it does, Wise has the option to have the code sent to your Whatsapp app.
Alipay also has a Transport function where you can get a QR code to pay for subway trips, bus trips etc. There are many features in this app that will help with your trip! It’s a “must have” app.
While cash is accepted, it is troublesome for vendors and the vendor may not have change readily available. While you should bring some cash, China is mostly a cash society, so you need Alipay (or wechat or both) to ensure easy payment for things. Credit cards, unless used through Alipay or Wechat, are not normally accepted or used in China. Same for debit cards.
There is a separate app for using Alipay in Hong Kong. The Alipay app will not work in Hong Kong and the Hong Kong Alipay app will not work in China.
Communication and Payments
For payments, you should install both Alipay and Wechat. For Alipay, see above…. and for communication, Wechat is a must!
Wechat or Weixin as it’s called in China is the app that Chinese people use to communicate. It also now has a payment platform for foreigners (as of July 2023). You should install this as the friends you will make on your journey will use it to keep in touch with you. It may be used for restaurant menus, tickets etc… Use the search function to look for events, tourist attractions etc. Tour guides will use it to keep in touch with you.
As of Oct 2024, Wechat upgraded the translation feature to include translation for mini-apps. This makes it much easier to use the mini apps for food delivery or ordering at fast food chains and restaurants or even shopping online! For info on how to Turn on and use this feature see this post : New Wechat Translation Feature Oct 2024
Note: See below for how to use Wechat Maps!
Trip – For Tours, Hotels and Tourist Sites to Visit
An app for your account at Trip.com – this is a great app and website for booking hotels. It can also be used to get train tickets. It also has great guides on the attractions in various cities.
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Maps
The GPS system in China is very precise – It updates your location if your take just a few steps. Many maps are only in Chinese, which presents a problem for foreigners.
Amap – NEW in 2025! English Map for China!
In January 2025 AMAP released an English version of their map! This is available on Android and Iphone. Just go into settings and change to English. If your phone is set to English it may open in English without changing the settings. Amap is very precise and likely your best option.
On Iphone – Apple Maps!
On the Iphone, you can use Apple Maps! It works well, is in English, and up to date.
Make sure you choose the correct map feature – Driving, Satellite, Transit or Explore! It’s probably best to turn on Transit.
Google Maps is Not Recommended: Google maps will work but is not accurate in China. Recently Google Maps showed a number of Beijing subway stations to be permanently closed even though they weren’t. If you have a Chinese sim card you would need a VPN for anything Google to work. Baidu maps are good, but only in Chinese.
Other Map Recommendations
Organic Maps
Organic maps offers an offline map so you don’t have to rely on data to look up your destination. Maps are available for major cities.
LingoMap
LingoMap is a translation of Alibaba Maps (known as AMap or 高德地图). It shows place, transit route, and street names in the original Chinese, Mandarin Pinyin, and English.
The map is rendered using Mapbox with up-to-date and reliable AMap data such as place search results and direction information drawn on top.
Download from their website at lingomap.app
One of the best map is Maps.me It costs $7.99 per month or approximately $70 per year but well worth the price. The best feature is that you can download maps for various regions to save on data costs.
Maps.me has driving, walking, and subway directions as well as an excellent search feature that finds places when you enter the pinyin name!
For Navigating Subways
Metroman – has subway maps for all the major cities in China. It also has a map feature. The app will help you plan trips from the Airport to your hotel, or plan your subway trip from one point to another i.e tourist attractions etc.
Apple Maps Tip
Click on the menu option, then select “transit”
Alipay (In Didi mini app)
You can also use the Didi app as your map tool in the Didi mini app within Alipay. Just use the map to find your destination without booking a ride.
Wechat Maps for your Current Location and Things Nearby (no search function)
Some people recommend Baidu maps but it’s in Chinese, so not helpful. That being said, Wechat has one of the best maps available but it requires a trick to access.
To use Wechat Maps,
- Go to Chats
- Choose a contact
- click the + button
- Click on Location
- Click on Real Time Location
- Use the map.
Translation Apps
Google Translate is also great, but Google products will not work if you have a Chinese sim and no vpn.
Microsoft Translate is a great app for translating both voice, text and images from over 20 languages to Mandarin or Cantonese. And it’s free! Simply speak into your phone and it will translate to Mandarin, then show the translation to the Chinese person. Then let the Chinese person speak into the phone and it will translate it to your language!
Booking Train Tickets
The app for booking train tickets is called 12306. There is an English version and a Chinese version. A benefit of the Chinese app is that you can select seats. On the English 12306 website you can not currently choose seats. The name of the app comes from the fact that the telephone number for trains in China is 12306 – sort of a 1-800 number in China. You can book tickets on Trip.com, or in the Trip app, or on the 12306 app.
Note that the app or website will not build a route for you. For example, trying to get a high speed train to Zhangjiajie from Chongqing requires viewing the train network map and realizing at the time I was travelling that for high speed trains I would have to go to Changsha then to Zhangjiajie. Instead I took a slower train from Chongqing to Zhangjiajie that was still quicker than the longer high speed train route.
VPN (Virtual Private Network)
Astrill or LetVpn are the VPNs that are currently working in China.
According to recent reports, ExpressVpn and Nordvpn do not currently work in China.
Note that as a vpn becomes more popular, it’s less likely to continue working. Most VPNs will slow down or not work when a major parade or national government congress is taking place.
Language Training Apps
Pimsleur Mandarin for English Speakers
If you want to learn Mandarin, I recommend the Pimsleur program. Level 1 will get you up to a level to bargain, check into hotels and order food!
Chat GPT – AI for building your itinerary!
Chat GPT is a great tool for suggestions on what to see. I used the prompt “I’m travelling to [Insert City Here] and spending [Insert number of days] there. I like nature, culture and great food but [do/do not] like shopping and tourist attractions. What places do you suggest I see? Please also suggest day trips from there.”
I ended up with great itineraries for Chongqing, Wuhan, Dazu caves, Beijing etc.