Visa-free policy highlights China's sincerity to improve ties with Japan

China's recent extending of its visa-free policy to the citizens of nine countries, including Japan, will not only increase personnel exchanges between China and these countries, but also become an important symbol of its expanded opening-up.

In addition to adding the nine countries to its visa-exemption list, effective from Nov 30 to the end of 2025, China has decided to further optimize the visa-free policy, including exchanges and visit purposes into the visa-free entry scope, and extending the period of visa-free stays from 15 to 30 days.

Since the end of last year when China experimented with unilateral visa-free policies for multiple countries in Europe and Southeast Asia, Japan kept communication lines open with China, requesting the resumption of the visa-free policy it had enjoyed to facilitate its business and personnel exchanges with China. The new measure will add new incentives to economic and trade ties between the two countries. Half an hour after China announced the policy, searches for Chinese destinations on online travel agency Ctrip.com's overseas platforms surged, with a 112 percent increase from Japan.