Beijing China 7 Day Itinerary
Beijing, China 7-Day Itinerary
Prepare for Beijing before you board the plane, not after you land. Google, Gmail, WhatsApp, Instagram, and most Western news sites are blocked by the Great Firewall. Download at least two VPNs, test both, and make sure they are running before you leave home; you cannot reliably install foreign VPN apps once inside China. Similarly, set up WeChat Pay or Alipay using your foreign bank card while still on an unrestricted network. Cash is now genuinely marginal in Beijing; a city of 22 million has largely moved to QR-code payments, from convenience stores to street food carts. When you do use your payment app in China, turn off the VPN first, because the apps may flag foreign IP addresses as suspicious and freeze the transaction.
Getting In
Beijing Capital International Airport (PEK) is connected to the city by the Airport Express, a dedicated rail line that takes 20 minutes to Dongzhimen station for CNY 25. Trains run from around 6:20am to 10:50pm. From Dongzhimen you connect to Line 2 or 13 of the subway for CNY 4-6 to reach central areas. Total cost from terminal to most central hotels: around CNY 30 (roughly EUR 4). As of December 2025, Air China domestic passengers can check in luggage at Dongzhimen station from 7:30 to 19:30, which is genuinely useful if you’re flying onward. Taxis from the airport to central Beijing cost CNY 100-150 and take 40-60 minutes depending on traffic, which on the capital’s ring roads can be severe.
Beijing Daxing International Airport (PKX), southwest of the city, serves different airlines; check which airport your carrier uses, as they are not interchangeable without significant additional travel.
Didi and Getting Around
Download Didi (China’s dominant ride-hailing app) before arrival. The English interface works well and solves the problem that most taxi drivers in Beijing do not speak English and cannot read a transliterated address. Hailing street taxis is possible but comes with significant communication friction. The subway system is extensive, cheap (CNY 4-7 per journey), and covers all major tourist sites. For the hutong areas, walking is usually faster than any vehicle.
Where to Stay
The Dongcheng district puts you closest to the Forbidden City, Tiananmen, and the hutong network around Nanluoguxiang and Shichahai. Mid-range hotels in Dongcheng run from CNY 500-800 per night. Wangfujing, the main shopping street, has several international chains. For atmosphere, the hutong guesthouses (courtyard hotels) in the Drum Tower area cost CNY 400-700 and are a genuinely different experience from a standard hotel room.
Day 1: Arrival, Wangfujing, Tiananmen
Land, navigate the Airport Express, and resist the urge to see everything on arrival day. Check in and walk to Wangfujing for orientation. The pedestrian street has the standard mix of international chains and Chinese retail, but at the north end is Wangfujing Snack Street with fried scorpions on skewers, lamb kebabs, and sweet rice cakes. The scorpions are edible but primarily exist to be photographed by tourists. The lamb kebabs (yang rou chuan) from a serious vendor are worth eating.
Dinner: Find a jianbing (Chinese crepe) cart in the hutongs near your hotel, which counts as both dinner and an education. The flatbread is cooked on a hot drum, an egg is cracked onto it, scallions and cilantro go on, then a salty fermented bean paste and a crispy wonton cracker, folded into a packet for CNY 8-15. The best jianbing carts are surrounded by office workers at 7:30am, but you can also find them in early evening. This is Beijing’s defining street breakfast food and it tastes significantly better than it sounds.
Day 2: Tiananmen Square and Forbidden City
Arrive at Tiananmen Square before 8am. The square is larger than most visitors expect (440,000 square metres) and contains Mao’s Mausoleum, the Monument to the People’s Heroes, and the Gate of Heavenly Peace with the famous portrait. Photography is unrestricted in the square itself.
The Forbidden City (Palace Museum) requires advance online booking on the official museum website. Tickets cost CNY 60 (April to October) or CNY 40 (November to March). Daily visitor numbers are capped; book at least a few days ahead, especially in summer. The complex contains 980 surviving buildings across 72 hectares and was the imperial palace for 24 emperors across the Ming and Qing dynasties. Budget four to five hours for a serious visit. The imperial gardens at the north end and the western residential quarters are considerably less crowded than the central axis and worth seeking out.
Lunch near the Forbidden City: Quanjude on Qianmen Street is the best-known Peking duck restaurant in Beijing and has been operating since 1864. It is genuinely good, large enough to always have a table, and the theatrical duck carving tableside is the canonical Peking duck experience. Budget CNY 200-300 per person. Liqun Roast Duck, buried in a hutong near the south gate of the Forbidden City, is smaller, less polished, and arguably better. Requires a reservation; cash only.
Evening: Nanluoguxiang, a hutong that has been tastefully commercialised into a walkable strip of coffee shops, craft beer bars, and independent food stalls. Good for an evening beer and people-watching.
Day 3: Great Wall at Mutianyu
The Mutianyu section, about 90 minutes north of central Beijing by car, is the best choice for first-time visitors. It is less crowded than Badaling, genuinely well-restored, and has a cable car up (CNY 80 return) and an optional toboggan slide down the mountain, which is popular for obvious reasons. A combined ticket (entrance, shuttle bus, cable car) costs around CNY 200. Book tickets on the official Mutianyu website; no advance reservation is required on non-holiday weekdays, but buying online saves queuing. Arrive before 10am.
The section to hike is towers 6 to 20, with the best views and the most complete fortifications between towers 14 and 20. Wear shoes you can walk three to four kilometres in, with significant stair climbing.
Avoid visiting on China’s Golden Week public holidays (May 1-5, October 1-7) and in July and August when domestic tourist numbers become extreme. April, May, September, and October are the optimal months.
Return to Beijing by late afternoon. Dinner in the Drum Tower area.
Day 4: Summer Palace and Lama Temple
The Summer Palace is the largest surviving imperial garden in China, built around Kunming Lake in the western suburbs. Entry is CNY 30 (garden) or CNY 60 (including the interior palaces). The Marble Boat at the north shore, an unfinished stone jetty built to mimic a paddlesteamer that the Empress Dowager Cixi reportedly funded by diverting naval budget, is an interesting historical detail. Rowboats can be rented on the lake for about CNY 50-80 per hour.
Afternoon: The Lama Temple (Yonghegong), Beijing’s largest functioning Tibetan Buddhist temple, is accessible by subway (Line 2/5 to Yonghegong station). The largest wooden Buddha sculpture inside, at 18 metres tall carved from a single sandalwood tree, is in the Wanfu Pavilion and is legitimately impressive. Entry CNY 25. The surrounding area has Confucius Temple, a night market, and a good concentration of noodle restaurants. Zhajiangmian (thick wheat noodles in fermented bean paste with pork) is the local staple and costs CNY 30-50 at a sit-down restaurant.
Day 5: Hutongs, Shichahai, and the Drum Tower
Take a morning walk through the hutong network around Gulou (the Drum Tower area). These narrow alleys date largely to the Yuan and Ming dynasties and represent the residential fabric of old Beijing, much of which was demolished in the 20th century. The surviving areas around Shichahai lake and Yandai Xie Jie (Tobacco Pipe Street) are the most atmospheric.
The Drum Tower (CNY 30) and adjacent Bell Tower (CNY 30) offer views over the hutong roofline to the north and south. Drum performances happen at set times, typically on the hour during busy periods. The towers are climbable and the views justify it.
Shichahai lake in summer has paddle boats, weeping willows, and bars with waterside seating that stay busy until midnight. Silver Ingot Bridge (Yinding Qiao) at the northern tip is a classic Beijing scene point and entirely free.
Day 6: 798 Art District and China National Museum
Morning: The 798 Art Zone in Chaoyang district occupies a former state munitions factory from the 1950s, now converted into studios, galleries, and restaurants. The Bauhaus-influenced factory buildings are the attraction as much as the art inside. Pace Beijing and Ullens Center for Contemporary Art (UCCA) anchor the district’s more serious gallery offering. Entry to most galleries is free; UCCA charges CNY 50 for major shows. The food in the district is expensive by Beijing standards, but the coffee is good.
Afternoon: The National Museum of China on the east side of Tiananmen Square holds one of the largest collections of Chinese historical artefacts in the world across 200,000 square metres of floor space. Admission is technically free but requires a passport registration and an online ticket. The permanent exhibition covering Chinese history from prehistoric times to the Qin unification is the most contextually useful for understanding what you’ve seen at the Forbidden City and the Ming Tombs.
For a final dinner worth planning: Dadong Roast Duck, the restaurant that industrialised the leaner “Supereme Peking Duck” style with a larger dining room than Quanjude and a more theatrical presentation. Book ahead; CNY 200-300 per person.
Day 7: Ming Tombs and Departure
If your flight is in the evening, the Ming Tombs at Changping, 50 kilometres northwest of Beijing, make a viable final morning trip. Thirteen Ming emperors are buried here, though only three tombs are open: Ding Ling (underground burial chamber, CNY 65), Zhao Ling (CNY 30), and Chang Ling (the largest, CNY 45). Chang Ling has the most impressive above-ground architecture; Ding Ling has the actual underground burial vault. The combined ticket covers access to the main sites for CNY 120.
If your flight is mid-afternoon, skip the tombs and do a final hutong walk or return to the Forbidden City’s less-visited western sections.
Airport Return: Airport Express from Dongzhimen to Terminal 3 takes 20 minutes. Allow 2.5-3 hours from central Beijing to your departure gate during peak travel periods.
Practical Notes
The subway is the most reliable transport in Beijing. A single journey card-tap costs CNY 3-7. Taxis are metered and honest; the problem is communication. Didi solves this. Cash is rarely needed but keep CNY 200-300 for smaller markets and older establishments. Learn the characters for Forbidden City (故宫), Great Wall (长城), and your hotel name in Chinese; showing a taxi driver Chinese text eliminates ambiguity. Pollution levels vary significantly by season; October and November are generally clearest. Download the air quality index app before arrival if respiratory conditions are a concern.