Using a Chinese Driving Licence Oversea’s

Lawrence Sheed // 18 Sep 2008 // 1 Comment

I wrote this for a post on an Expat site, its good info for those of you with Chinese licence’s going abroad.

China driver licence holders info:

China is not a signatory to the IDP (International Drivers Permit) international law.
So, China has NO IDP to issue,and no IDP issuer.

For China drivers licence holders, you just need an official translation of the licence into English (or the official language of the country you will be driving in) from a notary.

Suggest get that done here in China, where the notaries read Chinese.
Put a copy in your licence wallet, and you are good to drive in other countries.

Some other rules apply in certain countries – eg in Europe you can drive for a maximum of 6 months during visits, then they require you to apply for a local licence.

The basic facts aren’t clear (and they should be).

Basically each country thats a signatory has an official IDP issuer, and the IDP *must* be procured from them, or its invalid.

If the country is not a signatory, then a translation in the language of the destination country is sufficient.