How do you register a marriage in China as a foreigner in 2026?

Bring a valid passport or other international travel document, or a Foreign Permanent Resident ID Card if you hold one. The decisive paper is a certificate of single status. If your country is a Hague Apostille Convention member, Shanghai’s English marriage page accepts an apostilled certificate from your home competent authority or a single-status certificate issued by your embassy or consulate in China. Non-member countries follow notarisation plus Chinese or home-embassy legalisation paths listed on the same city guides: Apostille documents.

Add a Chinese translation of the single-status certificate and Apostille or legalisation pages from a qualified translation channel the office accepts. Shanghai notes a common six-month validity window on the single-status certificate from the issue date, so do not collect it too early. Bring the required number of couple photos to the office’s size and background rules. The Chinese partner brings a resident ID card. Revised national marriage-registration practice has moved many inland-resident filings toward ID-card based checklists; still confirm whether your district window asks for any extra household evidence on the appointment day.

Both partners book and attend the marriage-registration office together, fill the declaration, and receive marriage certificates when the registrar accepts the file. Shanghai English guidance highlights district-level access for international couples and notes that mainland Civil Affairs does not provide the same registration product for two foreigners. Guangdong and other provincial foreign-affairs pages describe related foreign-related procedures; treat your city’s Civil Affairs checklist as binding.

After marriage, family residence routes such as Q1 may open if you will live with a Chinese citizen host: Family reunion residence. Switching an existing work or study residence purpose after marriage is a separate Exit-Entry status change: Change status of residence. Keep apostilled kinship papers and the marriage booklet in the same folder used for later permanent-residence dreams: Get permanent residence. Mandarin forms are the default: Chinese bureaucracy without Chinese.