Chaoshan Accommodation Guide / First Trip to Chaoshan
How Many Nights in Shantou vs. Chaozhou? First-Trip Chaoshan Accommodation Guide (2026)
2026-10-03 GoChinaNow Editorial Team
First trip to Chaoshan — start with this accommodation principle
If it's your first trip to Chaoshan and your itinerary includes Shantou, Chaozhou, and Nan'ao Island, it's usually not advisable to switch hotels at every stop. Simply put: Only 2–3 days: try to set just one accommodation base. Around 4 days: 2 nights Shantou + 1 night Chaozhou is a manageable combination. Around 5 days: it becomes more suitable to add a Nan'ao Island stay based on your interests, or give Chaozhou an extra night. If travelling with elderly parents, young children, or a lot of large luggage, you can cut one more hotel switch from this standard. If your focus is the old town, food, and Nan'ao Island transport, Shantou works better as your first-half base. If you want to experience Chaozhou's old town at night, enjoy a slow breakfast in the morning, and drink gongfu tea, one night in Chaozhou is more meaningful.
#Chaoshan accommodation#How many nights in Shantou#How many nights in Chaozhou#Where to stay in Chaoshan#Chaoshan family travel#Chaoshan hotel guide
"On a first trip to Chaoshan, switching hotels more often doesn't mean you're experiencing more. For family travel, a well-located base is often more important than waking up in a different city every day."
On a first trip to Chaoshan, the hardest accommodation decision isn't which hotel to pick — it's: how many nights should you stay in Shantou? Should you stay in Chaozhou? Do you need to switch hotels again for Nan'ao Island? For families from Singapore and Malaysia, especially those travelling with parents, children, or several large suitcases, accommodation planning should start with your trip length, departure time, and where you're heading the next day. This article covers four common trip lengths — 2, 3, 4, and 5 days — and gives accommodation split suggestions for Shantou and Chaozhou, explaining when it makes sense to base in Shantou and when it's worth staying a night in Chaozhou.
Key highlights
- Accommodation splits for 2 to 5 days, all in one place
- How to decide between Shantou and Chaozhou
- Adjustment tips for travelling with parents vs. children
- Whether you really need a night on Nan'ao Island
- Avoid the luggage burden of constant hotel switches
If you're visiting Chaoshan for the first time and want a simple answer first:
For trips of 3 days or less, try to stay in just one city. For 4 days / 3 nights, consider 2 nights in Shantou and 1 night in Chaozhou. For 5 days or more, you can add another base depending on whether you're visiting Nan'ao Island, doing a Teochew ancestral roots journey, or travelling at a family-friendly pace.
This logic matters especially for Chinese families from Singapore and Malaysia. Many travel with parents, children, and several large suitcases. What really eats up time isn't the drive from Shantou to Chaozhou — it's packing up, checking out, storing luggage, and checking in again every day. Your accommodation should serve your route, not the other way around. Don't switch hotels just so you can say you've stayed in every city.
First trip to Chaoshan: how should you split your stay across 2, 3, 4, or 5 days?
Here's an overview.
Trip length
Suggested accommodation split
Best suited for
Hotel switch recommended?
2 days / 1 night
1 night in Shantou, or 1 night in Chaozhou
Pick one core city only
Not recommended
3 days / 2 nights
2 nights in Shantou; or 1 night Shantou + 1 night Chaozhou
Slow travel through Shantou + Chaozhou
Avoid switching if travelling with parents
4 days / 3 nights
2 nights Shantou + 1 night Chaozhou; or 3 nights Shantou
Shantou + Nan'ao + Chaozhou
One switch is fine
5 days / 4 nights
2 nights Shantou + 2 nights Chaozhou; or add 1 night on Nan'ao
Slower family trips, island stays, ancestral roots journeys
Decide based on your interests
This isn't a fixed template.
If your parents move slowly, your children need daily naps, or your family has four or five suitcases, switching hotels one less time is usually more important than a theoretically "smoother" route.
If the website backend can't accommodate a table, these four tiers can also be kept as the sectioned format in the main text below.
Only 2 days / 1 night — should you stay in Shantou or Chaozhou?
With only two days, don't try to cover Shantou, Chaozhou, and Nan'ao Island all at once.
Ask yourself what you most want to see this trip.
If it's your first time back and you want to eat well and explore the old qiaoxiang town
Stay in Shantou.
Xiaogongyuan (Little Park) Opening Port Area is itself one of Shantou's more important historical, cultural, and tourism districts. It was officially re-designated as a National AAA-level tourist attraction at the end of 2025, and Shantou's 2026 cultural tourism promotions continue to feature Xiaogongyuan's qilou arcades, Nan'ao's coastal scenery, and qiaoxiang culture as representative tourism highlights.
You could plan:
Arrive in Shantou in the afternoon
→ Xiaogongyuan and the old town
→ Dinner
→ One night in Shantou
→ Next morning, more breakfast and a half-day outing before heading home
This is the simplest arrangement.
If your main goal is Chaozhou's old town and traditional culture
Stay directly in Chaozhou.
Paifang Street, Guangji Bridge, and similar sites have long been key nodes of Chaozhou's old town cultural tourism. Guangdong's intangible cultural heritage tourism routes also link Paifang Street and Guangji Bridge into the same in-depth Chaozhou experience route.
With only one night, there's no need to sleep in Shantou first and then rush to Chaozhou the next day.
For 2 days / 1 night, the key is choosing a city, not choosing a hotel.
3 days / 2 nights — why do many families do well staying in Shantou the whole time?
If travelling with parents, for 3 days / 2 nights I usually lean towards:
2 nights in Shantou.
The reason isn't that Shantou is necessarily better than Chaozhou for accommodation — it's one less checkout.
You could plan it like this:
Day 1: Shantou
Day 2: Day trip to Chaozhou
Day 3: Half day in Shantou + head home
When you leave in the morning, your luggage stays at the hotel.
At night you return to the same room.
Elderly parents don't have to adjust to a new hotel, and the kids' things don't all need to be packed up.
If you'd like to look more closely at how to choose a family-friendly accommodation area, you can refer to GoChinaNow's Shantou family travel accommodation guide.
So when is it worth staying 1 night in Chaozhou on a 3-day / 2-night trip?
If your family:
Parents still have decent energy
Not much luggage
Really want to experience the old town at night
Enjoy a slow Chaozhou breakfast in the morning
Day 3 departure direction also works well
Then you could do:
Day 1: 1 night in Shantou
Day 2: 1 night in Chaozhou
Day 3: Half day in Chaozhou, then head home
Switching hotels once here is justified because you're getting a full Chaozhou evening and morning — not just switching cities for the sake of it.
For whether to stay inside Chaozhou's old town or on the outskirts, you can read more at Chaozhou accommodation: old town or downtown?.
4 days / 3 nights — what's the smoothest way to split between Shantou and Chaozhou?
For a first trip to Chaoshan, 4 days / 3 nights is fairly easy to plan.
There are two common approaches.
Option 1: 2 nights Shantou + 1 night Chaozhou
Suited for:
First-time visitors
Want to visit Nan'ao Island
Want to experience Chaozhou at night
Normal amount of luggage
Parents have reasonable energy
The route could be:
Day 1: Shantou
Day 2: Nan'ao Island, still staying in Shantou
Day 3: Head to Chaozhou, stay overnight in Chaozhou
Day 4: Half day in Chaozhou + head home
The advantage of this split:
You don't have to haul all your luggage to Nan'ao.
You only really check out on Day 3 when heading to Chaozhou.
Only one hotel switch.
Option 2: 3 consecutive nights in Shantou
Suited for:
Travelling with elderly parents
Travelling with young children
Three generations travelling together
Lots of luggage
Don't want to deal with checkout and luggage storage
You can still cover:
Shantou
→ Nan'ao Island
→ Chaozhou
→ Back to Shantou
Although Chaozhou requires a same-day return trip, the overall logistics for a family trip are actually simpler.
If your family has six or seven people plus a stroller, elderly parents' medication, and several large suitcases, this approach is often more realistic.
Want to visit Nan'ao Island — do you need to stay overnight on the island?
Not necessarily.
This is one of the easiest places in accommodation planning to end up "switching hotels one extra time."
Stay in Shantou if:
You just want to:
See the sea
Drive around the island
Visit the Qing'ao area
Have a seafood meal
Return to the city that evening
Then Nan'ao works perfectly as a day trip.
Especially on a first Chaoshan trip of only 3–4 days.
Staying in Shantou means you don't have to pack up the next day, and you don't have to drag suitcases from the island to Chaozhou on Day 3.
Stay on Nan'ao only if:
If:
The island itself is the main focus of your trip
Kids want to play in the sand and see the sea
You want to see the evening and the next morning
Your overall trip is around 5 days
You don't mind one more accommodation switch
Then consider staying one night on Nan'ao.
Shantou's latest cultural tourism promotions still feature Nan'ao's coastal scenery as one of the city's representative tourism resources.
But "worth visiting" and "must stay on the island" are two different things.
Want to experience Chaozhou's old town at night — do you have to stay in Chaozhou?
If Chaozhou is the highlight of your trip, I'd lean towards staying one night.
The reason is very concrete:
On a same-day return trip to Chaozhou, your family has usually already walked quite a bit by the afternoon.
After dinner, you look at the old town night views, and then you still have to drive back to Shantou. For younger travellers that's fine, but for parents it may not be comfortable.
If you stay in Chaozhou, you can end the evening whenever you like.
Tired? Just head back to the hotel.
The next morning you can come out for breakfast and stroll a section of the old town.
Chaozhou's official tourism planning has long treated the old town, Paifang Street, Guangji Bridge, and the Han River waterfront as core cultural tourism resources, and related plans emphasise the development of old town accommodation, teahouses, and tourism service facilities.
So if you genuinely want to experience Chaozhou's "evening + early morning," one night is worth it.
If you're only visiting the main sights during the day, a same-day return trip works perfectly well.
Travelling back with parents — how should you adjust your accommodation cities?
For parents, the priority order should be:
Fewer hotel switches > Room comfort > Vehicle access > Distance to attractions.
Especially for parents around 70.
Young people think:
"Tomorrow we switch to Chaozhou — it's only 40-something kilometres."
What elderly parents actually experience is:
Morning: sort out clothes
→ Pack medication
→ Pack toiletries
→ Organise suitcases
→ Check out
→ Get in the car
→ Get out of the car
→ Wait for check-in
→ Unpack everything again
And then do it all over again the next day.
So:
3 days / 2 nights
Prioritise one base.
4 days / 3 nights
Switch at most once.
5 days / 4 nights
Then consider two accommodation cities, or add Nan'ao.
If your parents are Teochew by ancestry and this trip includes ancestral roots arrangements, you should adjust your accommodation around your ancestral hometown rather than following a standard tourist route.
Travelling to Chaoshan with children — how does the accommodation approach differ?
The younger the children, the less suitable it is to switch hotels every day.
Families with young children usually need to consider:
Nap times
Strollers
Formula or children's food
Changes of clothes
Bath times
Sudden needs to return to the room and rest
So if you only have 3–4 days, I'd recommend making Shantou your fixed base.
Go to Chaozhou or Nan'ao during the day.
Come back at night.
If the children are older and the family really loves Chaozhou's old town, then you can arrange one night in Chaozhou.
That's when switching accommodation is genuinely worth the experience.
When you have a lot of luggage, why shouldn't you underestimate the cost of switching hotels?
Two people with just carry-on bags — switching hotels is easy.
But for families coming back from Singapore and Malaysia, the situation is often different:
Parents' large suitcases;
Your own luggage;
Children's things;
Chaoshan souvenirs you plan to bring back.
By Day 3, your suitcases will only be fuller than on Day 1.
The hidden costs of switching hotels include:
Packing time
Checkout time
Luggage handling
Waiting for check-in
Luggage storage
Reorganising everything
Calling a larger vehicle at short notice
These hours usually don't appear in the attraction tables of a "Chaoshan 4-day / 3-night itinerary," but they're very real.
So accommodation planning should first and foremost reduce unnecessary moving around.
If you're on a red-eye flight or arriving late at night, how should you handle the first night?
In this situation, don't count "arriving late" as a full tourism day.
For example, if you land very late at night:
The only task for the first night is check-in and rest.
The itinerary officially starts the next day.
Similarly, if you need to leave early in the morning on your last day, your "4 days / 3 nights" of actual sightseeing time may be closer to 3 days.
As of 2026-10-03, this article does not list specific international flights, schedules, or fares. Flight schedules are volatile information and should be re-confirmed with airlines, airports, and booking platforms based on your actual departure date.
When arriving late at night, your accommodation choice should actually be simple:
Easy vehicle access;
Clear check-in process;
Don't schedule an old town night tour for the first night.
First trip to Chaoshan — where is actually the best base?
No single city suits everyone.
Here's how to decide.
Better to base in Shantou if you:
Plan to visit Nan'ao;
Love Shantou food;
Are travelling with elderly parents and children;
Have a lot of luggage;
Want fewer hotel switches.
Worth staying a night in Chaozhou if you:
The old town is the highlight of your trip;
Enjoy night tours;
Want to experience gongfu tea and the old town's early morning;
Your Day 2 departure route works well.
Better to stay a night on Nan'ao if you:
The island is the core purpose of your trip;
Have at least 4–5 days;
Want to enjoy the sea at a slow pace rather than circling the island in one day.
It's not about "which city is best."
It's about:
Where you're going the next day, and whether it's worth the whole family moving luggage once more.
For different trip lengths, how would I split accommodation for first-time families?
If you don't want to overthink it, start with this logic:
2 days / 1 night
1 night in Shantou
or
1 night in Chaozhou
Pick one.
3 days / 2 nights
With parents:
2 nights in Shantou.
Younger families who want to stay in the old town:
1 night Shantou + 1 night Chaozhou.
4 days / 3 nights
Most families:
2 nights Shantou + 1 night Chaozhou.
More elderly parents and children:
3 nights Shantou.
5 days / 4 nights
Culture and food focused:
2 nights Shantou + 2 nights Chaozhou.
Island focused:
2 nights Shantou + 1 night Nan'ao + 1 night Chaozhou.
But at this point you already have two hotel switches.
If there are several elderly family members travelling together, I'd still consider cutting one switch.
Chaoshan accommodation split — FAQ
Q1: First trip to Chaoshan — is it more convenient to stay in Shantou or Chaozhou?
If you're also visiting Nan'ao Island and travelling with elderly parents and children, Shantou as your first-half base is usually easier to manage.
If your main focus is Chaozhou's old town, then staying directly in Chaozhou makes more sense.
Q2: Is Chaozhou worth two nights?
If your total trip is only 3–4 days, one night is usually enough to get the night tour and early morning experience on a first visit.
If you're really into history and culture, gongfu tea, and food, or you have ancestral roots arrangements, you can extend to two nights.
Q3: Do you have to stay on Nan'ao Island to visit it?
No.
When time is limited on a first Chaoshan trip, you can absolutely stay in Shantou and do Nan'ao as a day trip.
Only consider staying on the island if a seaside holiday is your main goal.
Q4: Travelling with 70-year-old parents on a 4-day / 3-night trip — how many hotel switches is appropriate?
Generally, at most one switch.
If your parents move slowly or have a lot of luggage, staying all three nights in the same hotel also works — just use a car for same-day return trips to Chaozhou and Nan'ao.
Q5: Arriving in Chaoshan in the early hours or late at night — does the first night count as a day?
It counts as a night of accommodation, of course, but don't count it as a full sightseeing day when planning.
Prioritise rest on the first night, and start the route properly the next day.
Conclusion: decide "how many nights" first, then "which hotel"
On a first trip to Chaoshan, it's easy to open a booking platform first and save a dozen hotels.
But the order should actually be reversed.
First work out:
How many days do you actually have?
Are you going to Nan'ao?
Do you want to stay for a Chaozhou evening?
Can your parents handle switching hotels?
Do the children need naps?
How much luggage do you have?
Where are you departing from on the way home?
Once you've answered these questions, then decide how many nights in Shantou and how many in Chaozhou. Choosing the specific hotel becomes much easier.
If you've already decided to base in Shantou, you can refer to GoChinaNow's Shantou family travel accommodation guide. If you're planning a night in Chaozhou, you can read Chaozhou accommodation: old town or downtown?.
For a family coming back from Singapore or Malaysia for the first time, accommodation planning doesn't need to be complicated.
One less pointless hotel switch and one more genuinely restful evening usually makes the whole Chaoshan trip much more comfortable.
If you'd like help planning airport transfers, accommodation cities, private car charter, Nan'ao Island, a pace that suits elderly parents and children, or an ancestral roots journey all together, you can contact GoChinaNow to put together a plan that fits your family based on your actual arrival and departure times. If you can handle transport and accommodation on your own, you can also simply use the accommodation splits in this article as your booking framework.