Passport renewals are routine at embassies and still create a China immigration gap. The residence permit or visa ink sits in a specific passport book. When the book number changes, Exit-Entry must connect your legal stay to the new document.
What is the update sequence after a new passport?
Collect the new passport from your embassy or consulate before the old residence sticker expires if you can. The Ministry of Commerce working-and-living guide tells foreigners who change passport details to apply to Exit-Entry for information updates within 10 days of the change. City English pages for Beijing reissuance and Chongqing passport renewal describe the same practical chain: new passport first, then police accommodation update, then Exit-Entry reissue.
Within 24 hours of receiving the new passport, many local guides also want you to re-register temporary accommodation so the police record shows the new number: Register address. Then book Exit-Entry with the new passport, the old passport if still available, accommodation registration, photos, and the application form. Lost-passport cases add a loss report before the embassy step: Report a lost passport.
Who else needs the new passport number?
Employers should update Foreigner's Work Permit records when the system requires a passport-number change, often within a short working-day window after personal data changes: Get a work permit. Banks, SIM real-name files, and payment apps that keyed the old passport may need a branch visit once Exit-Entry finishes: Open a bank account. Same-purpose residence renewals remain a separate diary item if the sticker end date is near: Renew a residence permit.
Do not travel internationally on the new passport while the old residence sticker is your only proof of stay permission unless Exit-Entry has already reissued the stay document. Mandarin-only counters are common: Chinese bureaucracy without Chinese.
Common misconceptions
Assuming airline staff can “see” the old residence permit in a cancelled passport fails. Border inspection wants current stay permission in the passport you present.
Assuming HR updating payroll finishes the immigration step also fails. Exit-Entry owns the residence sticker; the work-permit system is a second update.
Summary
After a new passport, re-register your address on the new number, then reissue or amend the residence permit at Exit-Entry inside the local update clock, and only then realign employer and bank records to the same passport bio page.
Sources
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