Can I use Wise in China: Yes! Send money to and from China using Wise today!

As expats living or traveling in another country, you might often face the problems of how to transfer money internationally at a reasonable rate and which is a good platform to use. Many of you may have already heard of or used Wise before you reside in China, but now you are wondering does Wise work in China. The answer is yes!

Wise works in China too. You can use Wise to transfer money to China and send money out of China now. Wise can send money to Alipay and WeChat. Here in this article, we are going to explain how wise works in China and what features are available to you in China, and how to use them.

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Can I use Wise in China?

The short answer is yes! The long answer is it depends on how you want to use it.

If you want to send money to China, Wise has been supporting Chinese Yuan (CNY) transfers to the Chinese Union Pay bank accounts since 2016 for both personal and business customers.¹

If you want to send money out of China, following China remittance regulations, not everyone in China can use Wise to send money out of China, so it’s important to know who is able to use Wise in China:

1. You are a non-mainland Chinese individual (this includes people from Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Macau)
2. You have earned and paid tax on a salary in mainland China after January 2019.

You can learn more detail about transferring CNY using Wise here.

Which countries can’t I use Wise in?

You can use Wise in most countries around the world, including China. But right now, there are some places where you won’t be able to open or log in to, a Wise account:

Afghanistan, Belarus, Burundi, Central African Republic, Chad, Congo, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Cuba, Region of Crimea, Eritrea, Iran, Iraq, North Korea, Libya, Myanmar, Somalia, Republic of South Sudan, Russia, Sudan, Syria, Yemen, Venezuela

More details here: Which countries can I use Wise in?

You can now use Wise to send money out of China⁶

In July 2023, Wise enabled users to send money from China. This means you can transfer your CNY income to other countries. We support users to hold and convert to over 40 currencies including USD, EURO, POUNDS, AUD, CAD, SGD, etc. And you can send money using Wise to 160+ countries in the world.

If sending money out of China with Wise, we have a limit of 100,000 CNY per transaction at the moment. The overall money transfer limit depends on your annual income in China and the amount of tax you paid in China on your income, etc.

At present, you can only use Wise to send CNY from China to another account you own. This can be your bank account outside of China or your Wise Account. To send to your Wise Account, you need to add your account details as the recipient.

You can also use Wise to send money to China

Wise has supported transferring money to China since 2016. You can send it to a Chinese UnionPay bank account using either a personal or business Wise account. And you can top up your Wise account to support your CNY transfer in 21 currencies(including AUD, CAD, CHF, EUR, GBP, HKD, JPY, MYR, SGD, USD, etc). Wise also can transfer money to Alipay and WeChat, more on this later.

The recipients of your transfer to China can only be individuals with a Chinese National ID card or business recipients with a CNY-denominated account in Mainland China.

Wondering how much and what are the limits on transfer money to China? It depends on where you are sending it from.

1. In the US, there are no limits to international transfer limits, but your bank or local financial provider is required to report any transfer over 10000 USD to the IRS. ²⁺³(Learn more about USD transfer limits here)
2. In UK, any international transfer of over 1000 GBP requires full verification of fund sources.⁴
3. In China, however, if you are sending money to a mainland Chinese recipient, they have a general cap of receiving 50000 USD per person per year. Any amount more than this, certain documents need to be provided.⁵

You can transfer money to Alipay and WeChat with Wise

Wise can transfer money to both Alipay and WeChat. The illustration below shows you the step-by-step guide to how to use Wise to send money to WeChat or Alipay. To do this you only need a few steps in Wise App:

1. Login to your Wise account App
2. Click “Recipients”
3. Click “ Add”
4. Select your target transfer currency to CNY
5. Select recipient’s “Bank details” from either UnionPay, Alipay or Wechat
6. Fill in the recipient’s details account info

One thing you should know is that sending money from Wise to WeChat and Alipay at the moment is only available for personal Wise accounts not for business Wise accounts. And there is a limit to send to Alipay and wechat recipients:

Each transaction is capped at 50,000 CNY, with an annual limit of 500,000 CNY per recipient. Each recipient is also subject to a monthly limit of 5 transactions per month.

The 500,000 CNY annual limit and 5 transactions per month include payments the recipient gets on their Alipay account from all services — not only Wise.

You can click and learn details about sending money from Wise to WeChat and sending money from Wise to Alipay.

Wise: A simple way to transfer money in and out of China

Founded in 2011, Wise is an international money transfer provider servicing 16 million happy customers globally. You can use Wise to send money to over 70 countries in the world. For expats living and working in China, Wise can be a helpful tool to transfer your legal earnings in CNY to your own bank account abroad now. For international students studying in China, you can also use Wise to transfer money to China to support your study and living cost there.

Pay for your transfers with Alipay

We’ve introduced an easier way for you to pay for your transfers — Alipay.

Whether you’re paying expenses in another country or sending money to family back home, you can use Alipay to pay for transfers of up to 50,000 CNY.

Unlike bank transfers, there are no minimum limits on what you can send and Alipay operates all day, every day. So you can send money at a time that suits you, not them.

How to pay with Alipay

1. Enter an amount: Select CNY as the currency you’re sending from, then enter how much and which currency you’re sending to — you can send up to 50,000 CNY per transfer.
2. Choose your recipient: This needs to be either your own account outside of China or your Wise balance.
3. Select Alipay as your payment method: If you’re on your phone, you’ll be automatically redirected to your Alipay app. If you’re using our website, you’ll be shown a QR code which you can scan from your Alipay app.
4. Confirm payment: Once you’ve paid, go back to the Wise app or website and select ‘I have paid’. Your transfer will then be on its way.

We have a Wise App available in English which you can download in the Apple store or Google Play. This can save you a lot of time going to Chinese banks, communicating with the staff and filling out the forms etc. With Wise, you only have to verify your identity once in our Application.

Send money with Wise

Please also be informed that Wise in China is operating under a local partner’s license.