Attraction
Forbidden City (Palace Museum)
The walled palace of the Ming and Qing emperors, now the Palace Museum, with almost a thousand surviving buildings and a vast collection of art and…
China stretches from the Himalayas and Mount Everest in the west to the long eastern coast where Shanghai sits at the mouth of the Yangtze. It has 60 UNESCO World Heritage Sites, including the Great Wall, the Grand Canal and the Forbidden City, the Ming-era imperial palace in the capital, Beijing. Beyond the great historic sights, travellers come for the regional cooking, from Shanghai's soup dumplings and pan-fried buns to the spicy dishes of Sichuan. The high-speed rail network, by far the longest in the world, links Shanghai with Beijing in under five hours, which makes it possible to combine several regions in a single trip.
Attraction
The walled palace of the Ming and Qing emperors, now the Palace Museum, with almost a thousand surviving buildings and a vast collection of art and…
Attraction
Shanghai's colonial-era waterfront, a 1.6-kilometre line of 52 banks, hotels and trading houses facing the Lujiazui skyline across the Huangpu River.
Attraction
The Ming and Qing emperors' altar complex for prayers for good harvests, set in a large park where Beijing residents gather each morning to exercise and…
Attraction
A Ming-dynasty private garden of rockeries, ponds and halls in Shanghai's Old City, begun in 1559 and set beside the Huxinting Teahouse and Yuyuan Bazaar.
Attraction
A museum of ancient Chinese art with more than 120,000 objects, housed in a ding-shaped building on People's Square with galleries of bronzes, ceramics, painting and…
Attraction
The Qing dynasty imperial garden on Kunming Lake and Longevity Hill, with the Long Corridor, the Marble Boat and the Tower of Buddhist Incense.
Café
A traditional-style Qianmen teahouse named after the writer Lao She, serving tea and snacks by day and staging Peking opera and folk arts shows in the…
Café
A two-floor Starbucks roastery on West Nanjing Road with a copper cask, a 27-metre coffee bar, a Princi bakery and a Shanghai-only coffee blend.
Café
A café, bar and gallery in a renovated courtyard house on Gulou East Street, serving North European breakfasts, homemade cakes, coffee and cocktails near the Drum…
Café
The historic teahouse on the pond outside Yu Garden, reached by the zigzag Nine-turn Bridge and reopened in 2025 after nearly two years of restoration.
Café
A small speciality coffee shop on Taiyuan Road run by Peng Jinyang, the 2025 World Brewers Cup champion, with a brewing bar and seasonal pour-overs.
Café
A small café by the Shichahai lakes whose fourth-floor rooftop terrace overlooks Houhai and the Drum and Bell Towers, serving coffee, cold drinks and light meals.
Hotel
The Art Deco former Cathay Hotel at the corner of the Bund and Nanjing Road, built by Sir Victor Sassoon in 1929 and home to the…
Hotel
A five-star, all-suite hotel on Goldfish Lane off Wangfujing, home to the Michelin-starred French restaurant Jing and the courtyard-style Cantonese restaurant Huang Ting.
Hotel
A luxury hotel spread across 42 traditional courtyard houses in the Qianmen hutongs, with Cantonese and Italian dining, a hutong cocktail bar and a spa.
Hotel
An Art Deco-inspired luxury hotel at the northern end of the Bund, opened in 2009 in the former British Consulate gardens with river views and a…
Hotel
A luxury hotel in Chaoyang with seven restaurants and lounges, including the Michelin-starred House of Dynasties, a large heated indoor pool and the Sense spa.
Hotel
A luxury hotel built around the 1911 Shanghai Club at No. 2 on the Bund, home of the restored Long Bar, with a modern tower behind…
Bar
A cocktail bar on the 80th floor of the China World Summit Wing in the CBD, billed as Beijing's highest, with city views, live acts and…
Bar
Shingo Gokan's three-floor speakeasy, opened in 2014 behind a fake bookcase in a bar-equipment shop on Middle Fuxing Road.
Bar
The cocktail bar and late-night lounge of Mandarin Oriental Wangfujing, with an outdoor terrace looking over the roofs of the Forbidden City.
Bar
A neighbourhood cocktail bar on Jinxian Road, ranked No. 19 in Asia's 50 Best Bars 2026, with a daytime front bar and a playful evening menu.
Bar
The Beijing branch of New York's Blue Note jazz club, opened in 2016 underground at 23 Qianmen East Street, with live jazz most nights and French…
Bar
The Peace Hotel's ground-floor bar on the Bund, where the veteran Old Jazz Band plays classic tunes every night in the former Cathay Hotel.
Restaurant
A Shanghainese restaurant trading since 1862 and holding a Michelin star, known for yellow croaker in wine lees sauce and stir-fried river shrimp.
Restaurant
The first branch of Beijing's best-known roast duck restaurant, founded on Qianmen in 1864 and still roasting ducks in hanging ovens over hardwood fires.
Restaurant
A Michelin-starred contemporary Chinese restaurant in Dongcheng, known for roast duck from young birds and tableside braised sea cucumber.
Restaurant
The Yu Garden xiaolongbao house founded in 1900, a China Time-honoured Brand and Michelin Bib Gourmand known for pork and crab roe soup dumplings.
Restaurant
A two-Michelin-star vegetarian restaurant in a converted courtyard house beside the Lama Temple, serving long seasonal tasting menus that can be made vegan.
Restaurant
Chef Stefan Stiller's counter restaurant in Changning, the only three-Michelin-star restaurant in the 2026 Shanghai guide, serving a seasonal tasting menu.
Thing to do
A self-guided walk from People's Square along East Nanjing Road's 1.2-kilometre pedestrian street to the Bund, finishing with the short ferry ride across to Lujiazui.
Thing to do
A restored Ming section of the Great Wall about 70 km north-east of Beijing, with 22 watchtowers, a cable car, a chairlift and a toboggan ride…
Thing to do
Three linked lakes north of Beihai Park, once the end of the Grand Canal, surrounded by hutongs, princely mansions, bars and the Drum and Bell Towers.
Thing to do
A three-kilometre walk through the former French Concession, from László Hudec's Wukang Mansion along plane-tree-lined Wukang Road to the shops and cafés of Anfu Road.
Thing to do
A former 1950s electronics factory complex in Chaoyang, now Beijing's best-known art district with galleries, studios, design shops and the UCCA Center for Contemporary Art.
Thing to do
A maze of 1930s shikumen lanes off Taikang Road, saved from demolition and now filled with more than 200 small cafés, studios, craft shops and bars.
Tour operator
A Beijing hiking company running since 2001, leading scheduled group hikes on unrestored Great Wall sections and in the hills and villages around the city.
Tour operator
Sightseeing boats from Shiliupu that sail north past the Bund and Lujiazui to Yangpu Bridge and back, by day or after dark when both banks are…
Tour operator
Small-group evening food tours of Shanghai's neighbourhood eateries, with 15 or more tastings at seated stops and drinks included, run by UnTour since 2010.
Tour operator
A Beijing tour company founded in 2011 that runs guided day hikes, multi-day treks and camping trips on wild and restored sections of the Great Wall.
Tour operator
A Beijing history company founded in 2005 that runs hutong walks and talks from its public history space in Dashilar, drawing on its collection of old…
Tour operator
Small-boat cruises along Suzhou Creek between the Bund and the western parks, passing century-old bridges, warehouses and the Sihang Warehouse memorial.
High-speed trains are the easiest way to travel between major cities, on a network of about 48,000 kilometres; the fastest Beijing to Shanghai trains take under five hours.
Spring and autumn are the most comfortable seasons in eastern China, including Shanghai; summers are hot and humid with typhoons possible, and winters are cold and damp.
Beijing for the Forbidden City and the Great Wall, the canal towns of the Yangtze delta such as Zhujiajiao, and the historic cities along the Grand Canal are popular choices.