Prices in China 🇨🇳
What 7 everyday items cost in China, shown in US dollars, in CNY, and as roughly how long someone earning the average local wage works to buy one.
Chinese prices vary enormously between tier-one cities and smaller ones, so a single national figure hides a wide spread. Imported and branded goods carry a premium; domestically produced staples are among the cheapest in the game.
What things cost
| Item | USD | Local | Work time |
|---|---|---|---|
| Big Mac | $3.66 | 25.5 CNY | 40 min |
| Coca-Cola (330ml can) | $0.48 | 3.5 CNY | 5 min |
| Cappuccino | $2.96 | 20.04 CNY | 32 min |
| Milk (1 litre) | $1.79 | 12.12 CNY | 20 min |
| Eggs (dozen) | $1.58 | 10.69 CNY | 17 min |
| Apples (1 kg) | $1.83 | 12.39 CNY | 20 min |
| Gasoline (1 litre) | $1.24 | 8.39 CNY | 14 min |
Local-currency figures are converted from US dollars at recent exchange rates, except the Big Mac, which is published in local currency by The Economist and converted the other way. Work time divides the dollar price by an estimated average hourly wage — the roughest number on this page. See methodology.
How China compares
Relative to the rest of the game, China is most expensive for milk, where it ranks 7th out of 32 countries at $1.79 — against a global median of $1.54.
It is relatively cheapest for coca-cola at $0.48, which is 31st of 33 — only 2 countries in the game are cheaper.
Measured against local earnings rather than dollars, the item that takes the longest to afford here is big mac, at roughly 40 minutes of the average wage. Dollar prices and work-time prices often rank countries very differently — that gap is usually the more interesting number.
Play a puzzle
China comes up in the daily puzzle roughly once every 33 days, paired with a different item each time. Play today's puzzle or browse the archive of past rounds.