12306 for Foreign Passports: Booking and Boarding Guide

Choose a channel before you enter passenger details

12306 is China Railway’s official booking service. Its English FAQ says that the English website supports valid foreign passports and allows ticket purchase, changes, refunds and destination changes. Its registration page also says that only foreign passports are accepted there. A document supported by another 12306 interface should not therefore be assumed to work in the English registration form.

The account owner and the ticket passenger are separate roles. The FAQ describes booking for another person through My Passengers when the account is in an eligible verification state. For a group, prepare a separate accurate passenger record for each traveler; do not buy every ticket under the organizer’s passport.

Use a staffed railway ticket counter if the online identity process cannot be resolved. A hotel can help translate the station names or explain your question, but hotel assistance is not railway approval of a passenger record. If you use a booking agent, keep its order reference and support details: an agent order may require action through that agent rather than through your own 12306 account.

Use the official rule for your passport’s name fields

12306 publishes a dedicated foreign-passport name and number entry guide. It says to use the readable identity section of the physical document as the main reference and the machine-readable zone as a supporting reference. English-letter name groups are separated by one space. The examples below are the railway’s published examples, not names from a test booking.

Do not impose a single surname-first rule on every passport layout. Match the heading pattern on your actual document to the appropriate official example. If a booking interface separates given and family names into individual boxes, follow its own current instructions instead of pasting a combined name into each box.

The same official guide addresses special cases. It says to preserve spaces in the name, use the Latin-letter information where several scripts are printed, and permits omission of titles such as Miss, Mr and Master. For punctuation such as hyphens, apostrophes or commas, it allows reference to the passport’s machine-readable name, replacing the group separators < and << with spaces. For a second or former name in parentheses, its example omits the parenthetical name.

Its foreign-passport verification instructions say that characters beyond a total name length of 64 are not entered. This is the published instruction for that verification workflow; it does not prove that every agent’s form has the same field limit. If your name or document layout does not fit the examples, ask railway staff to confirm the entry before buying. Avoid trying several improvised spellings while a ticket is being booked.

Check the number and verification result separately

On the number tab, the official guide says to enter the passport number compactly without spaces and to omit a printed “No” label. Its example is 751234567. Distinguish the actual document number from a label next to it; do not substitute a visa number, national ID number or booking reference.

The guide also says to stop when the number field is full rather than enter an overflow elsewhere. It does not give a universal numeric field length. If your document number seems to be truncated or rejected, obtain confirmation through the official workflow or a counter; guessing which characters to remove can create a mismatch.

Check nationality, document type, number, expiry date, birth date and any other required fields before saving. A renewed passport deserves a fresh check of an old passenger profile. Registration, passenger verification, ticket purchase and payment are different stages: reaching one stage is not proof that all the others succeeded.

Keep screenshots of an error and the wording of its status privately for support. This article does not test registration with a real passport, verify a traveler’s identity or demonstrate a completed payment. The current prompts in the official service determine the next step.

Choose exact stations and check the ticket before payment

A city name is not enough. Beijing South and Beijing West are different stations; Shanghai Hongqiao is a specific station rather than an alternative spelling of Shanghai. Compare the full departure and arrival station names on the search result with the hotel transfer you intend to use. Use our station-name worksheet if directional words are unfamiliar.

Before paying, review the travel date, train number, both stations, class, passenger list and the displayed change and refund conditions. For a connection, check whether the second train departs from the same station. A cross-city station transfer needs a separate transport plan and should not be treated as a platform change.

Do not assume a foreign bank card will work simply because the train is available. Follow the payment methods and authentication prompts shown for your booking channel. If a payment appears to fail, check the order’s actual status before paying again; a bank notification alone does not settle whether a ticket was issued.

After purchase, save the confirmed train number, time, exact stations, carriage and seat, booking channel and order reference. Our ticket-field guide helps distinguish these details. Keep passport numbers and booking references out of public travel posts.

Carry the original document used for the ticket

12306’s FAQ says that an e-ticket is an electronic transport voucher. For station entry, exit and boarding, travelers need the original valid identity document used to purchase it. The itinerary sheet and reimbursement receipt are not tickets. A screenshot is useful as a reminder of the train and seat, but it is not a substitute for that passport.

Keep the passport accessible before the station entrance. Follow the station’s document-check and security arrangements. If a gate does not read the passport, use the staffed assistance point rather than assuming the booking has disappeared. Check the departure display for your actual train number and gate.

Allow time for reaching the correct station, document questions, security, walking and boarding. The official FAQ says to follow the station’s boarding-closing announcements; there is no single closing time proved for every station by this guide. Ask earlier if a document issue needs attention. A planned buffer is more useful than arriving just before the printed departure.

For example, imagine that your phone shows a confirmed train but an older passenger profile lists your previous passport. That is a document problem to resolve before station day, not a reason to hope that the seat screenshot will override the mismatch. Contact the booking channel and railway for the permitted correction or ticket action.

Resolve the specific problem instead of restarting everything

A counter visit is most productive when you can show the passport, date, train number, exact stations and the action you want: purchase, identity help, change or refund. A complicated story about apps is less helpful than those concrete details. If a train may be missed, our bilingual railway help card gives short phrases; it does not promise a free replacement ticket.

Common questions