China Step by StepPractical intelligence

Essential apps for China

This subject is normally written up as a confident must-install list. We cannot write that list honestly. The single record behind the claim that certain apps are missing from the mainland China App Store is technology-media reporting of an April 2024 Apple statement, not an Apple page, and nobody has re-verified it for 2026. Several other everyday claims — that Google services do not work, that Google Maps is unusable — have no retrievable official source at all. So this page is organised the other way round: what a first-party source actually states about each service, and what is only reported or inferred, marked as such.

Should I do it before China?

Yes — finish this before you fly

Install everything from the app store of your own country and sign in to each app once before you fly. Part of the reasoning rests on records we have labelled unverified, and we would rather say so than pretend otherwise. The asymmetry is what settles it: doing the downloads at home costs an evening, while the fallback if the reporting is accurate — downloading from inside China, on a network you may not be able to use, into a store that may not list the app — might not exist at all.

How

  1. Do before arrivalDownload and open every app you expect to need before you leave: messaging, maps, translation, banking, airline. The reported reason is that WhatsApp, Threads, Telegram and Signal were removed from the mainland China App Store on 19 April 2024 at the request of the Cyberspace Administration of China. The source is media reporting of an Apple statement rather than an Apple page, and the current listing status was not re-checked, so treat it as unconfirmed rather than as fact.1
  2. Do before arrivalTreat Google search, Gmail, Google Maps, Google Drive and YouTube as possibly unavailable rather than certainly unavailable. No retrievable official source from Google or from a Chinese authority states this, so the record is editorial inference. Prepare on that basis: save tickets, hotel confirmations, insurance and visa documents as local PDFs or screenshots, download offline maps and offline translation packs, and keep a non-Gmail backup address. This site publishes no methods for getting around network controls.2
  3. Do before arrivalThe same treatment applies to WhatsApp, Instagram and Facebook: commonly unusable, no retrievable official source, recorded as inference. The instruction that follows is concrete anyway — do not let one of them be the only channel to your family, your hotel or a guide. Agree a backup channel before leaving, and save the hotel phone number and Chinese address as a local screenshot.3
  4. Do before arrivalGoogle Maps gets the same caveat and a stronger practical warning: our record says it does not work as an everyday navigation tool in mainland China, and also that no written statement from Google or a Chinese authority could be found, so this too is inference. The prepared alternative is to install an English-capable Chinese map app at home and to screenshot the Chinese names of your hotel and main destinations.4
  5. Do before arrivalThat alternative is AMap Global, the English version launched on 21 January 2025 for users outside China, downloadable directly from the App Store and Google Play, with English labelling for attractions, restaurants and hotels, live traffic, arrival estimates and lane-level navigation; 14 further languages were added on 9 July 2025. The source does not say whether an account is required or whether a foreign phone number is accepted, so install and open it before you travel.5
  6. Can do in ChinaApple Maps is the one mapping claim with a first-party source. The Apple feature-availability page lists turn-by-turn navigation, traffic, lane guidance, speed limits and custom route creation for mainland China, and does not list mainland China for Transit, Look Around, cycling directions or AR walking directions. So it can answer driving and walking questions, but it is not the tool for metro and bus routes.6
  7. Do before arrivalFor ride-hailing, install the mainland China DiDi app, which the 2025 official guide says supports registration with a foreign phone number and a foreign bank card, and which offers economy, taxi, comfort and premium service types. Do not install DiDi-Rider: that is the overseas product, and it does not hail cars in mainland China. The guide does not list which card networks actually bind, so treat that part as untested.7
  8. Do before arrivalYou do not have to install DiDi at all. The same official guide gives two in-wallet routes: in Alipay, tap Travel then Taxi and enter pick-up and destination; in Weixin, tap Me, then Services, then Transport Services or DiDi. It also notes that Trip.com airport transfers can be paid directly with an international card, which is the one ride worth arranging before you land.8
  9. Do before arrivalFor Weixin Pay, the help centre states directly that a mainland China (+86) number is not required, provided your international number can receive SMS codes. That is the clearest first-party statement we have on the Chinese-phone-number question for any app.9
  10. Do before arrivalFor Alipay the evidence is one step weaker. The official payment guide shows registration as download the app, then register or sign in with a phone number, on a screen offering a country or region selector, which implies a mainland number is not a precondition — but no sentence in any first-party source states that an overseas number is accepted, so this is read off the flow rather than quoted. Registration depends on receiving an SMS code, so complete it at home while your own number works normally.10
  11. Do before arrivalSkip the UnionPay App unless you hold a UnionPay card. The official payment guide notes in its UnionPay App section that the app supports overseas UnionPay cards issued in places such as Hong Kong and Macao, and does not state support for Visa or Mastercard issued elsewhere. Guide sites routinely list it beside Alipay and Weixin Pay; for a European traveller it is mostly wasted time and data.12
  12. Do before arrivalThe rail app is 12306. Registration accepts an email address, which matters because the phone numbers it accepts are registered in mainland China, Hong Kong, Macao or Taiwan. Register and submit the passport verification at home: verification normally takes three to five working days.13

What can go wrong

You install the DiDi app your own app store put at the top of the results.

What to do instead That is usually DiDi-Rider, the overseas product, which cannot hail a car in mainland China. Install the mainland China DiDi app, or use the ride-hailing entry inside Alipay or Weixin.7

A guide gives you an exact Alipay menu path for passport verification and your app does not match it.

What to do instead No first-party Alipay help page describing passport-based verification for international users could be retrieved on 14 September 2026 — the candidate URLs returned 403 errors, expired forms or developer documentation. Those step lists come from third-party guides, and the in-app flow changes between versions. Use the in-app help, reached from the headset icon, rather than a copied step list.11

You install the UnionPay App expecting to add your Visa or Mastercard to it.

What to do instead The official guide describes it as supporting overseas UnionPay cards issued in places such as Hong Kong and Macao. Put the effort into Alipay and Weixin Pay instead; the UnionPay App is only relevant if you want its prepaid Tour Card.12

Your only copy of the flight and hotel confirmations is in Gmail.

What to do instead Google services may not be reachable, although we found no official source that says so. Save the confirmations as local PDFs or screenshots on the phone before you fly, along with offline maps and an offline translation pack.2

Your family can only reach you on WhatsApp, and the hotel left you only a WhatsApp number.

What to do instead These services are commonly unusable in mainland China, again without an official source confirming it. Agree a backup channel before departure and save the hotel telephone number and its Chinese address as a local screenshot.3

You decide to download whatever you turn out to need once you are in China.

What to do instead The app may not be listed in the store you can reach, and you may not have a connection to download it with. Install and sign in to everything from your own store first; that is the whole of this page.1

Last verified and sources

Each record below is shown as provenance: who published it, what kind of document it is, how far it reaches and when we last checked it. The source’s own wording is not reproduced here — most of these documents are published in Chinese, and a translation of ours would be a paraphrase standing where a citation should be. Follow the link to read any of them in the original.

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