For a couple of years, the standard advice for a China trip was: land, open Alipay or WeChat Pay, activate a prepaid "Tour Card," load it with cash or a foreign card, done. That advice is now behind the times. Both companies have been winding the Tour Card down since 2024, and the thing that replaced it — binding your own foreign card directly to the app — is simpler than the card it's replacing. Here's how it actually works in 2026.

Why the Tour Card is going away

Tour Cards existed to solve one problem: foreign cards couldn't be linked to Alipay or WeChat Pay directly, so tourists needed a prepaid workaround, usually issued in partnership with a Chinese bank, with its own deposit and top-up process. Once both apps opened direct binding of foreign-issued cards — a rollout that ran through 2023 and 2024 — that workaround stopped being necessary. If you still see a "Tour Card" option in an older blog post or a bank's tourist material, treat it as legacy; the live path now is direct binding.

Setting up Alipay with a foreign card

  1. Download and register the Alipay app using a phone number that can receive SMS while you're travelling — do this before you land if you can, in case connectivity is patchy on arrival.
  2. Verify your identity first. Go to Me → Settings → Account and Security → Identity Information, select "Foreigner" → "Passport," upload a clear photo of your passport's information page, then complete a short face-scan (blink or turn your head on request). Approval is usually automatic and lands in minutes; officially it can take up to 24 hours.
  3. Add your card. Go to Me → Bank Cards → Add Card and enter the card number, expiry, and CVV, authorizing through your bank's 3-D Secure step. Alipay runs a small test charge that reverses automatically once the card is confirmed.

Visa, Mastercard, JCB, Discover, and Diners Club are all supported from foreign issuers; American Express works with some issuing banks but not universally.

Setting up WeChat Pay with a foreign card

  1. Register on the international WeChat app with an overseas number, and set a six-digit payment password.
  2. Complete real-name verification with your passport — the same photo-plus-face-scan process as Alipay.
  3. Go to Me → Services → Wallet → Bank Cards → Add a Card, enter your card details, and confirm via the SMS code your bank sends.

As of 2026 WeChat Pay accepts Visa, Mastercard, JCB, Diners Club, Discover, and UnionPay International. It's strict about matching details: the name on the card has to match your passport exactly, and virtual or prepaid cards are generally rejected.

What it actually costs, and the current limits

Both apps charge the same way: payments of ¥200 or under are free, anything above carries a 3% surcharge, and a foreign-issued UnionPay card is exempt from that surcharge on either app. That 3% is on top of whatever your own bank charges for a foreign-currency transaction, so check your card's foreign transaction fee before you rely on it heavily.

Spending limits are where guides disagree, mostly because the People's Bank of China raised the regulatory ceiling for foreign visitors' mobile payments in 2024, and not every app or article has caught up with the same numbers. The figure to anchor on is the PBOC ceiling itself: US$5,000 per transaction and US$50,000 per year (roughly ¥36,000 and ¥360,000), unlocked once your real-name verification clears. Some in-app defaults and third-party guides still cite lower or slightly different RMB figures, so if a big purchase is close to a limit, verify inside the app rather than trusting any single blog post — this one included.

One thing worth checking when you bind a new card: WeChat Pay has been running a promotion giving newly-bound cards a 60-day fee-free window on daily spending under ¥1,000. It's not guaranteed to still be live when you travel, but it costs nothing to check at setup.

When a payment gets declined

This is the part the old Tour Card mostly avoided, because it was prepaid — a direct-bound card can fail for reasons that have nothing to do with China. In rough order of likelihood:

  • Your bank flagged it. A sudden run of charges from Shanghai looks like fraud to a lot of foreign banks. Call or message your bank before you travel and tell them where you're going.
  • The merchant's QR code doesn't take foreign cards. Some small vendors' payment codes are only configured for domestic accounts. Try a different vendor or fall back to cash.
  • Verification didn't fully clear. A blurry passport photo, poor lighting on the face scan, or a name that doesn't match your card exactly are the most common causes — redo it somewhere brighter and double-check the spelling matches your card.
  • Risk control flagged the transaction itself. Occasionally the app's own fraud system blocks a payment for no reason you'll ever get an explanation for. Retrying a few minutes later, or with a different payment method, usually clears it.

The sensible backup plan

Direct card binding is reliable enough now that it's the default recommendation, but don't travel on it alone. Carry a UnionPay-branded card if your bank offers one — it's fee-exempt on both apps and widely accepted at ATMs if you need cash. And keep a modest amount of cash on hand regardless: small vendors, some taxis, and rural day trips outside the city are still places where a phone won't always save you.