How to Book China Attraction Tickets With a Foreign Passport

Attraction Booking Comparison

Checked on 16 October 2026. All release times are Beijing time (UTC+8). “Not confirmed” means the checked source does not establish current passport-number booking; it does not mean foreigners are excluded. These are documentation checks, not completed booking tests.

On a phone, swipe the table sideways or use the keyboard arrow keys when the table is focused. Follow the official rule link in each row before booking.

Zizhuyuan Park is a separate, free, no-reservation example in the Beijing guide. Do not apply one branch’s rules to another branch or to a ticketed special exhibition.

How to Book Tickets Step by Step

1. Choose the exact venue and visit date. Check the branch, exhibition, closure days and any temporary notice. Some ordinary galleries need no reservation even when a special experience does.
2. Open the official channel from the venue’s website. Check its document list and release window in the comparison above. For WeChat preparation, see essential apps for China travel.
3. Select passport (护照), if offered. Enter your own details as requested and check them against the original passport. Follow the form’s name instructions; there is no verified universal rule for name order, spaces or middle names. If the field is missing or rejects your number, contact the venue.
4. Choose a session and complete the order. Check every visitor, branch and date before payment. For payment preparation, use our guide to paying in China with foreign cards, Alipay and cash. A saved visitor record or a bank debit alone does not prove admission is booked.
5. Check the successful order and save the confirmation. Keep the QR code, entry instructions and cancellation deadline. Add the visit to your China travel preparation checklist. If travelling between cities, book transport separately using the 12306 foreign-passport train booking guide.
6. Bring the original booked passport and arrive within the entry window. Follow the venue’s staff-assisted verification instructions when the scanner cannot process it. A service window is not a promise of a same-day ticket.

Official Rules by Attraction

The rules below distinguish explicit passport acceptance, broader wording about overseas visitors, and historical notices. Official source links and verification limits appear at the end of this guide.

Palace Museum, Beijing

The museum publishes detailed booking and entry rules. Booking is real-name for everyone, including visitors who would enter free and the adults with them, and the museum sells no same-day tickets. The English visitor page on its multilingual site says plainly that "foreign visitors are required to provide passport numbers during the online booking", and the Chinese rule lists passport as one of the documents for visitors from outside the mainland, alongside the two travel permits, the two residence permits and the permanent residence card. One document may hold one ticket per visit day, the ticket is for that person only, and no change of ticket type, date, session or visitor is allowed after purchase.

• Official channelThe 故宫博物院 WeChat mini program, which the museum names as the channel to use, ; use ticket.dpm.org.cn to read the official ticketing rules and reach the museum’s booking route. The multilingual site explains the rule in English; the ordering interface itself is Chinese.
• ReleaseTickets and exhibition places open at 20:00 seven days before the visit date, used only on that date. Closed Mondays except statutory holidays.
• EntryWumen (午门) is the only entrance, and you must carry the original document you booked with. The museum says face-recognition equipment assists the real-name check, that face data is compared in real time and not stored, and that staff handle anything the equipment cannot. Morning sessions stop admitting at 12:00; afternoon sessions do not begin before 11:00. Exit by Shenwu Men or Donghua Men.
• Price¥60 peak (1 April to 31 October), ¥40 off-peak, plus ¥10 each for the Treasure Gallery and the Clock Gallery.
• Refund and no-showAn unused ticket may be returned through the original channel before 24:00 on the day before your visit with no penalty; after that it counts as one no-show, at most one per person per day, and three no-shows within 180 days bar you from booking for 60 days from the day after the third. Money returns along the original payment route within five working days.
• Contact400-950-1925, 08:00 to 20:00 all year, on the visitor rules page; [email protected] on the English page. Ticket windows at the visitor centre, the Treasure Gallery and the Clock Gallery work 08:30 to 16:00 in peak season and 08:30 to 15:30 in the off season.

One dated example shows how the pieces move together. To mark the second anniversary of the Central Axis inscription the museum opened free on Monday 27 July 2026, with bookings from 20:00 on 24 July through the mini program only, and the notice added that on that day the ticket windows at Duanmen, the Treasure Gallery and the Clock Gallery would not provide service. This was a date-specific exception, not a current walk-in ticket route.

Emperor Qinshihuang's Mausoleum Site Museum, Xi'an

The Terracotta Army museum explicitly accepts passport details for online booking, but its current release window remains unconfirmed. Its standing visitor page states that visitors including those entitled to free entry, visitors from Hong Kong, Macao, Taiwan and abroad, book through the official website and the WeChat accounts, that the website accepts a second-generation ID card or passport details, and that visitors pass the check lane with an original document from a list that ends with 护照. A pre-holiday notice dated 20 April 2023 describes that year’s May holiday arrangements. Its release times are historical, not verified 2026 instructions.

• Official channelbmy.com.cn and the two official WeChat accounts it names.
• ReleaseCurrent advance window and release times: not confirmed. The 20 April 2023 notice described 10:00, 15:00 and 20:00 releases for that holiday only. Check the official booking channel for your date.
• Capacity65,000 visitors a day, and sales stop at the limit.
• EntryThe check lane verifies the ticket against the original document, with passport named.
• ContactTicketing 029-81399127, complaints and assistance 029-81399174.

The caveat is worth stating because it is unusual: the checked guide still links older announcements. That does not establish that the museum has published no newer rules elsewhere; the current release schedule needs confirmation in its official booking channel.

Shaanxi History Museum, Xi'an

This museum explicitly lists passports and describes staff verification at its Qin Han branch. Its visiting guide lists passport as booking document number four of five for the main building, states that visitors from outside the mainland may book with the two travel permits, the two residence permits or a passport, and describes entry as a person-to-document comparison. The Qin Han annex goes further: mainland visitors scan an ID card, and visitors from outside the mainland may enter with a passport, with staff verifying on site and completing the entry procedure by hand.

• ReleaseFive days ahead, at 17:00 each day: the example on the page is 1 July for 6 July. You may pre-fill visitor details, but a pre-filled record is not a booking, unfinished ones are cleared at 24:00, and one pre-fill may hold at most five visitors.
• LimitsOne document may appear in at most three pre-fills a day, may hold one booking order a day, at most four successful orders in 30 days including refunds, and one WeChat account at most three orders every seven days.
• EntryOriginal document plus the successful order, in your session; the page says plainly that a mismatch or a missed session means no entry. If you arrive without the original document, the stated route is the south gate service window with an electronic ID or a police-issued certificate and the order, exchanging for an entry pass. That route is published by this museum, not by all of them.
• Paid exhibitionsThe Tang dynasty mural gallery and the current special exhibition sell both online in advance and on site inside the museum, and buying one of those tickets means you do not need also to book the free basic exhibition.
• Refund and no-showRefund through the booking platform before checking stops for your session; after that it is treated as a no-show, and a no-show bars booking for 180 calendar days.
• Contact and hours029-85253806. The page prints the current season as 6 May to 14 November 2026, and a historical holiday notice dated 20 September 2026 set 25 to 27 September and 1 to 7 October at 07:30 to 20:30, checking stops at 19:30, with 17,500 entries a day for those dates only; those holiday hours are not the regular October schedule.

National Museum of China, Beijing

Included mainly as the honest limit of this exercise. Its visitor booking notice, printed 25 July 2025 and in force from 1 August 2025, plus a further notice of 18 September 2026, describe a free ticket up to seven days ahead, released at 17:00, with refund possible until 15:00 on the day of visit, entry at the north gate with the original booked document, and a quota regime: one booking per account per week, up to five people, at most ten saved travellers which cannot be altered for 30 days, four bookings per document per month and one per day. Refunds still count against the quota. Three failures to appear cut the document off for 30 days.

The checked 2025 booking notice and September 2026 reminder do not name passport as a document type. However, a museum reply to a visitor in its 2022 message-board archive explicitly accepted passports. This is historical evidence, not confirmation of the current booking form. Booking also requires an account that has completed real-name authentication, which was introduced on 22 April 2025, became mandatory on 6 May 2025, and uses national online identity authentication or WeChat authentication. What that means for a visitor whose identity documents are foreign, the official text does not say, and neither do we. The demand figures it does give explain why people assume the door is shut: in 2024 the museum reported around 1.6 million people a day chasing 26,000 tickets in summer, and about 520,000 a day for the same 26,000 in the off season.

Suzhou Museum

The checked main-building notice does not name passports; that leaves its current passport booking procedure unconfirmed. Its booking notice, which carries no date at all, runs a full real-name reservation system seven days ahead with the system open 08:00 to 23:00, allows same-day booking if capacity remains, sets the last same-day booking at 20 minutes before entry closes, permits one change per ticket and only into another session on the same date, and defines missed attendance generously: arrive outside 30 minutes either side of your slot and the ticket is void. Two consecutive misses, or four within 90 days, trigger a 90-day booking block for this museum's tickets and activities; behaviour that breaks the rules can put a visitor on a barred list for a year. Children who have no ID card are booked with the ID number on their household registration.

Two useful things survive the passport silence. The west branch does not require a booking at all: visitors come and pass security, with flow control if the building reaches capacity. And the exemption list, which covers service personnel, people with disabilities, and people aged 70 and above with limited mobility and one accompanying adult, is written around "corresponding valid documents", which is the same phrasing problem as everywhere else.

Shanghai Museum, People's Square

This branch publishes a booking channel specifically for overseas visitors. Its visitor notice, in force since 30 June 2026, says individual visitors book through the museum's WeChat mini program and, for inbound visitors specifically, that they may book and buy through trip.com, then enter with the original document through the south gate individual lane. Groups of twenty or more book by telephone seven days ahead, not counting the day itself, on 021-63724550, with a daily cap and no admission for unbooked walk-in groups. Opening is 09:00 to 17:00 with entry stopping at 15:00, and late-opening runs to 21:00 with entry stopping at 19:00, closed Mondays other than national holidays. Visitors aged 65 and above, serving and retired military, fire and rescue personnel and police enter through the south gate green lane on showing their own valid document and a same-day ticket; people with disabilities enter free on their own document. The notice says “original valid document” without listing passport as the booking document; its audio-guide deposit reference to a passport does not prove passport-number booking. Confirm the selected ticket’s accepted documents. The foreign-language audio guide rents for ¥40 with a deposit of ¥400, or US$50, or a passport.

A temporary wrinkle matters if you are going for the collections rather than a show: during the Americas exhibition, dated 9 July 2026 to 14 November 2027 on the page, the People's Square building shows nothing else, and permanent and other special exhibitions move to the East Branch at 1952 Century Avenue.

Shanghai Museum East

The current official English visitor guide says individual visitors do not need a reservation for general entry. It requires original valid ID, without naming passports. Confirm passport handling with the museum; the older 15 March 2024 passport-booking notice predates the no-reservation arrangement and does not establish today’s form requirements.

Curio-City and the Digital Gallery still require Special Reservation. Paid exhibitions and groups have separate arrangements. Groups of 20 or more book by phone seven days ahead, excluding the visit day. The guide directs individuals to the B1 East Gate at 1952 Century Avenue. Check current opening information before travelling; People’s Square rules do not apply to this building.

Beijing municipal parks

The only case where a government publishes the whole thing for you in English. The city's inbound-services guide, whose retrieved guide has no visible publication date, walks through buying tickets for nine municipal parks on the 畅游公园 website, WeChat account or mini program, notes that the site defaults to Chinese and can be switched to English from the "Language" control at the top right, and states two lines that settle most arguments: foreign visitors can purchase tickets with passports or permanent residence permits, and at the gate you scan the e-ticket QR code and present a valid ID such as your passport. The nine parks are the Summer Palace, Temple of Heaven, Beihai, Jingshan, Zhongshan Park, Xiangshan, Beijing Zoo, Yuyuantan and Taoranting. Zizhuyuan Park is free and needs no reservation; other parks run their own platforms.

Passport Verification and Entry

This is where the passport question really bites, and the wording of the sources is more informative than any summary. The Shaanxi museum's rule for its Qin Han annex is the explicit one: mainland visitors scan an ID card, and visitors from outside the mainland may use a passport, with staff completing verification. The Palace Museum promises document-original-plus-face-assist and hands exceptions to staff. Beijing's parks ask for two things, the code and the passport. The National Museum of China refuses entry to anyone whose document does not match the booking. Read together, they describe a self-service lane built around the mainland card system, and a human being on the other side of it. Plan on the person.

• Carry the originalVenues with explicit document-check rules generally ask for the original booked document; the comparison flags notices that are less specific. A phone photo of a passport data page appears in none of these rules; the one museum that offers a fallback for a forgotten document asks for an electronic ID or a police certificate, which is a route for residents.
• Treat the session as hardThe Palace Museum will not scan you in before 11:00 for an afternoon ticket or after 12:00 for a morning one. Suzhou voids a ticket outside 30 minutes either side. The Xi'an museums say a missed session is simply no entry, and the national museum says the same. Being late is not a ticket problem, it is a no-show, with the consequences below.
• Ask the venue about staff assistanceThat expectation has a source: the nine-ministry instruction of June 2024 says keep the necessary staffed windows, and the 2024 payment notices say keep a window that takes cash and foreign cards. These policy directions do not guarantee a same-day ticket or a successful passport verification at every venue.

Common Booking Problems

Frequently Asked Questions

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