Can You Visit the Terracotta Warriors Without Reading Chinese?

You can visit the Terracotta Warriors（兵马俑）aka Emperor Qinshihuang’s Mausoleum Site Museum （秦始皇帝陵博物院）your own, without a group tour. Whether you should depends on three things: a Chinese phone number to buy tickets, the ability to read Chinese characters to get there and back, and how much of the site you actually want to see. I went on my own. Here’s what each of those actually means.

Should You Go on Your Own, or Book a Tour?

Work through these in order.

1. Do you have a Chinese phone number, or a working way to pay through WeChat? Tickets are booked through a WeChat mini program. Without a Chinese number for verification, you may not be able to complete the booking yourself. If this is you, buy the entrance ticket through an OTA instead: KLOOK’s Emperor Qinshihuang’s Mausoleum Site Museum Ticket is the ticket-only listing, and Trip.com’s page for the museum lists the same ticket next to the tours.
2. Can you read Chinese characters? The booking screen, the bus stop, and the signs along the way are in Chinese. A translation app can tell you roughly what something says, but if you can’t read the original yourself, you have no way to check whether the translation is right. That matters most on the booking screen, where you’re entering passport details. If you can’t read Chinese and don’t want to risk it, book through an OTA.
3. If you can read Chinese and have a way to pay, you can go on your own. I took the subway from Zhonglou (钟楼) station to Huaqing Palace station, visited Huaqing Palace, then caught a public bus from there to the Terracotta Warriors, RMB 5, paid by QR code. I came back the same way, in reverse. I read Chinese, though, so I can’t promise the same experience if you don’t.
4. Either way, decide how much you want to see. Just the Terracotta Warriors museum (兵马俑), or the Mausoleum of Qin Shi Huang (秦始皇陵) too? A quick look, or something more in-depth? This decides which ticket or tour fits you, more on that below.

KLOOK sells these one listing at a time, so these are individual products: a private half-day tour of the museum, or a direct round-trip bus from the city centre if transport is all you need.

Getting There

I didn’t go straight from downtown to the Terracotta Warriors. I stopped at Huaqing Palace on the way: subway from Zhonglou (钟楼), the Bell Tower area in central Xi’an, to Huaqing Palace station. After visiting Huaqing Palace (more on that below), I caught a public bus from right outside to the Terracotta Warriors. The fare was RMB 5, paid by QR code. On the way back, I reversed the same route: bus from the Terracotta Warriors to Huaqing Palace, then the subway back to Zhonglou.

I can’t tell you about a direct route that skips Huaqing Palace, since I didn’t take one. If you’re headed straight to the Terracotta Warriors, check a transit app for the most direct option.

I could read the signage at the stations and the bus stop, so I didn’t have much trouble. I don’t have the experience to tell you how this goes if you can’t read Chinese. If you’re not confident, that’s one more reason to book a tour or a transport-plus-entrance package instead.

Touts Between the Bus Stop and the Entrance

There were a number of people offering guide services between the bus stop and the museum entrance. I didn’t hire one, so I can’t tell you anything about what you’d actually get. Once I was through the entrance, I didn’t see this happening, it seemed limited to the approach, not inside.

Booking Tickets

I booked through a WeChat mini program, which I believe is the same as the official booking channel, though I’m not fully certain they’re the same thing. Booking is real-name: you enter passport details, and you’re expected to bring your passport to the entrance.

A translation app can get you through the screens, but it isn’t perfect, and if you can’t read the original Chinese, you have no way to tell where it’s gotten something wrong. On a form asking for passport information, that’s a bigger risk than it sounds.

Inside: How Much Time to Set Aside

I spent about 4 hours at the Terracotta Warriors museum itself. I wanted to see the Mausoleum of Qin Shi Huang as well, but I ran out of time. If you want to add that, budget 5 to 6 hours total, not 4. (You may see this area referred to as Lishan Garden, 骊山园, in some English material. I didn’t have time to go, so I can’t describe it beyond that.)

Entrance to the museum was RMB 120 at the time of my visit; I’d confirm the current price before you go. English signage is on the exhibits themselves, I didn’t see it used for directions, so don’t count on it to help you find your way around, only to read what you’re looking at.

I think there were restrooms inside, though I didn’t pay close enough attention to tell you exactly where.

Should You Hire a Guide?

I overheard both an English-speaking and a Chinese-speaking guide leading separate group tours while I was there. Eavesdropping on both, the level of knowledge was shallow. If you already know the history, a typical tour guide here will likely feel thin.

If you want a guide booked through an OTA rather than one of the people outside the entrance, use booking count and rating together: avoid listings with only a handful of bookings, and favor ones with hundreds or thousands of bookings and a high rating. That won’t guarantee you get a knowledgeable guide, the ones I overheard were running full, presumably well-reviewed group tours, but it filters out the clear outliers.

Foreign-language tours, English, Japanese, and so on, cost more than Chinese-language tours for the same itinerary. I’d read that as a language surcharge rather than a sign of better quality.

Is a Group Tour Right for You?

• Just want a look around, nothing deep: a standard group tour works fine.
• Already know the history and want depth: a standard group tour will likely feel thin.
• Not confident getting there and back on your own, but genuinely interested: look for a tour limited to the Terracotta Warriors and the Mausoleum specifically, or a round-trip-transport-plus-entrance package, rather than a large multi-stop tour.

Huaqing Palace: A Short Stop on the Way

I stopped at Huaqing Palace (华清宫), the hot spring site between Zhonglou and the Terracotta Warriors, on my way out. It dates back to the Qin dynasty, but what it’s actually known for is a Tang dynasty story: Emperor Xuanzong and his consort Yang Guifei (杨贵妃), best known from the poet Bai Juyi（白居易）’s “Song of Everlasting Sorrow（长恨歌）,” still a widely told story across East Asia. That’s really the whole draw, I wouldn’t expect much beyond it.

Worth noting: Yang Guifei’s story is Tang dynasty, roughly a thousand years after Qin Shi Huang built the Terracotta Army. If you visit both sites in one day, as I did, you’re covering close to a millennium of history, not one continuous era. I knew that going in, and stopping to actually take that in was part of what made it worth the detour. I’d guess that’s easy to lose if you’re being moved briskly through both stops on a packed group tour.

If the Huaqing Palace detour appeals but the transit doesn’t, there’s a one-day tour that bundles the warriors, Huaqing Palace, and the Song of Everlasting Sorrow show. That’s roughly the route I took, minus the subway.

Prices, in RMB

What I can confirm from my own trip: the museum entrance ticket was RMB 120 in the Terracotta Warriors, and the public bus between Huaqing Palace and the Terracotta Warriors was RMB 5 each way, paid by QR code. I didn’t note the subway fare from Zhonglou to Huaqing Palace.

Ticket-plus-transport packages and guided tours are also sold through Trip.com and KLOOK, at a range of prices depending on what’s bundled in. I don’t have current RMB pricing pinned down for those, check the listing directly before you book.

If you don’t have a Chinese phone number, can’t read Chinese, or would rather skip the WeChat booking and the transit, you don’t have to do any of this yourself.

On KLOOK, the ticket-only equivalent is the Emperor Qinshihuang’s Mausoleum Site Museum Ticket. Trip.com’s page for the museum lists current ticket and tour prices in one place, and the museum’s own site is what points you there.