President Obama is in Asia this week at APEC and the headline has been the climate change deal he announced with China…but wait, there’s more! Of particular interest to travelers is another deal cut with China to extend visas for short-term business travelers, tourists, and students. The new agreement will make travel to China significantly easier.
Here are the details from the State Department, but below is the gist of the new rules–
- Tourist and short-term business visa for U.S. citizens traveling to China issued after 12 November 2014 will be multiple entry and valid for 10 years (currently, most tourist visas are good for only one year and business visas are often single-entry).
- U.S. students visas will now be valid up to five years
- The same arrangement will apply for Chinese seeking a B-category non-immigrant visa to the USA
Why this is good news
Would you not be more likely to return to China if you didn’t have to pay $160+ each year for a visa but instead had a visa good for 10 years? Breaking down barriers reduces access costs and make travel between the two countries more attractive. It will now be easier to do business, easier to check out different regions of China over multiple trips, and easier to study abroad.
Further, Chinese consumers are excellent customers and this new visa regime will strengthen U.S. businesses as the U.S. becomes a more inviting place to vacation, do business, and spend money.
My Chinese visa has expired and renewing now is much more palatable, knowing it will be valid for the next decade.
This means that a visa would outlast my passport – what happens to the visa when my passport expires? Do I just get a replacement copy of the same visa in the new passport?
@Ron: Good question. If your passport expires before the visa, you’ll just need to bring the old passport along with your new passport. You do not get a new sticker in the new passport without paying the fee again.
My Chinese visa expired in October. My last trip at the end of October took advantage of the 72 in-transit policy. I heard a radio guy talking about how bad the change is — to allow Chinese into our country for extended periods of time (worried about corporate espionage or something). I hoped the rules would apply for both US and Chinese citizens. I thought he was way off base and will likely apply for a new visa in the new year.
@RDimperio: I’m sure corporate espionage is a mutual concern, but I think the benefits of these new visa reciprocity measure far outweigh any hypothetical IP problems.
If only they let you retroactively get 10 years if you got a Chinese visa within the past year. Wishful thinking.
Great news, was planning to go to China with the family anyways 🙂
Great news, but I’ll be (pleasantly) surprised if the Chinese government can implement this soon. I know it says Nov 12, but when will you ACTUALLY be able to get a 10 year China visa?
This will be good news for some folks I know who regularly visit China.
I don’t know if you received the communication from United yet, but the PQD requirements for 2016 went up considerably, to $3000 increments instead of $2500. For Silver, it is now $3000; Gold is $6000; Platinum is $9000; 1K is $12,000.