Visa-free entries to China surge 48% year-on-year in third quarter

Foreign nationals made 7.25 million visits to China in the third quarter of 2025 under visa-free policies, a 48.3 percent year-on-year increase, the National Immigration Administration said on Thursday.

Among them, visa-free entries accounted for 72.2 percent of all entries made by foreign nationals, the administration said.

According to the authority, China recorded 178 million border crossings in the third quarter, an increase of 12.9 percent year-on-year.

Among these crossings, mainland residents accounted for approximately 89.37 million, up 13.8 percent year-on-year. Residents from Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan made about 68.7 million crossings, a 6.2 percent year-on-year increase.

Lin Yongsheng, a spokesman for the administration, stated that since the beginning of this year, with the continuous optimization of visa-free policies and the ongoing recovery of international flights, exchanges between Chinese and foreign nationals have seen a significant increase.

In the first three quarters of this year, national immigration authorities inspected a total of 510 million border crossings, a 14.3 percent increase compared to the same period last year, approaching historical peak levels, he said.

Driven by various favorable policies, the number of mainland residents traveling to Hong Kong and Macao has increased significantly this year, Lin noted.

The average daily number of tourists to Hong Kong reached 86,000, while to Macao, it was 56,000. Compared to 2024, these figures represented an increase of 16.2 percent and 24.4 percent, respectively, it said.