Best eSIM for China

When you should not buy from us

No eSIM suits every trip. These are the cases where something other than our China plan is the better buy.

• You need a Chinese phone number for WeChat Pay, Alipay or a delivery app. Those want a local number tied to a local identity, and no travel eSIM gives you one.
• You are staying for months. A local contract is cheaper over that horizon, though you would then be inside the firewall and would need your own VPN.
• You only need data in Hong Kong or Macau. Those are separate networks, and a plan covering them costs less than one covering the mainland.

What to compare before you buy

The cheapest China eSIM is rarely the best one. These are the things that decide whether a plan actually works for your trip.

• Price per gigabyte, not the headline price: a $5 plan with 1 GB costs more per gigabyte than a $13 plan with 5 GB.
• Whether hotspot and tethering are allowed. Many cheap plans block them, which matters the moment you open a laptop.
• What happens when the data runs out: can you top up the same eSIM, or must you buy and install a new one?
• What 'unlimited' means on that plan: almost always a daily allowance at full speed, then a much slower connection.
• Whether validity starts when you buy, when you install or when you first connect. Each of our plan pages says which.
• Whether there is a refund if the eSIM will not work on your phone, and whether a human answers when something goes wrong.

What actually matters in China

• The reason a travel eSIM matters here is routing, not coverage. A local SIM gives excellent 5G and a filtered internet; ours gives the same networks with the traffic breaking out abroad.
• Coverage on China Mobile, China Unicom and China Telecom is genuinely excellent, including on the high-speed rail and deep in the metro.
• Download offline maps before you fly anyway - not because the data will fail, but because the mapping apps most visitors use have poor detail for China however good the connection.

How much data do you need for China?

300-500 MB a day is typical, higher than most destinations because translation and mapping do more work here. 5 GB covers a week comfortably.

Not sure? The data calculator works it out from how you actually use your phone.