Chinese New Year Traditions: A Modern Guide to Spring Festival in 2027 (What’s Kept, Changed, and Quietly Disappeared)

Most lists of Chinese New Year traditions read like they were written in 1985. Eight items. Red envelopes for kids. Dumplings. Dragon dances. The Year of the Beast myth, told the same way every year.

The traditions are real. The way they’re practised in 2026, 2027, and onward is different from what those lists describe — and that difference is the whole story. Some rituals have survived three thousand years. Some are quietly being replaced. Some are being reinvented by Gen Z in ways their grandparents find baffling or funny or both.

This guide covers what’s still observed, what’s changed in the post-pandemic decade, what varies by region, and what foreign visitors should actually expect to see during Spring Festival 2027.

Quick facts

Festival name: 春节 (Chūn Jié, Spring Festival)

2027 dates: February 6 (Saturday) — Lantern Festival closes February 20

2027 zodiac: Fire Goat / Fire Sheep (丁未, Dīng Wèi)

Length: 15 days traditionally; usually an 8-day public holiday in mainland China

The point: Family reunion, fresh start, ancestral remembrance, transition into a new lunar year

What Chinese New Year Actually Is

Chinese New Year — known as Spring Festival (春节, Chūn Jié) in China — marks the first day of the lunar calendar’s new year. It’s the most important holiday in Chinese culture by every measure: by the number of people who celebrate it (around 1.4 billion in China alone, plus diaspora globally), by the scale of the travel it generates (roughly 9 billion trips during the 40-day Spring Festival travel period), and by the cultural weight it carries.

The holiday is part of a larger calendar of traditional Chinese festivals, but it’s the only one that effectively shuts down the country. Schools close for about four weeks, factories close for two to three, and most non-essential businesses close for at least the first week.

It’s also a deeply private holiday. Despite the public face — fireworks, parades, dragon dances — the real centre of CNY is the family dinner on New Year’s Eve. Most of what foreign tourists see during a CNY visit happens around an event the locals are inside their homes for.

Spring Festival vs Lunar New Year vs Chinese New Year

These three names get used interchangeably. They aren’t exactly the same:

• Chinese New Year is the English term most common in the US and UK, referring specifically to the holiday in Chinese culture.
• Lunar New Year is the broader, more inclusive term. It covers related celebrations across East and Southeast Asia, including Seollal in Korea, Tết in Vietnam, Tsagaan Sar in Mongolia, and other festivals based on lunar or lunisolar calendars.
• Spring Festival is the literal translation of 春节 (Chūn Jié), the term used inside China.

If you’re celebrating with friends from various Asian backgrounds, Lunar New Year is the more accurate umbrella term. If you’re specifically talking about the Chinese version, Chinese New Year or Spring Festival is fine.

Chinese New Year Traditions and Customs

Before the Festival: Two Weeks of Preparation

CNY isn’t a one-day event for any family that observes it traditionally. The preparation period — roughly two weeks before the eve — is half the holiday. Most traditions lists lump these activities together; in actual practice they each have their own moment.

The Deep Clean

Sometime in the last week of the old lunar year, Chinese families do a thorough household cleaning called 大扫除 (dà sǎo chú, big sweep clean). The literal point is to clear the year of accumulated dust and disorder. The cultural point is to sweep away bad luck so the new year arrives in a clean space.

The catch — once the new year starts, you don’t sweep for the first day or two. Sweeping on Day 1 would symbolically push the year’s fresh luck out the door. The big clean happens before the eve, then the broom gets put away.

In practice today, the deep clean is one of the traditions that’s mostly held up. Most urban families still do it. Some hire cleaning services for the day, which is itself a small modern industry around Spring Festival. Rural families do it themselves, often as a multi-day project that includes airing out bedding, washing curtains, and dusting shrines.

New Year Shopping

The shopping for 年货 (nián huò, New Year goods) starts around two weeks before the eve. The list traditionally includes:

• Dried goods, candy, and sweets for guests
• Fresh produce and meats for the reunion dinner
• New clothes (especially red items)
• Decorations: spring couplets, paper cuts, lanterns
• Gifts for visits to extended family
• Alcohol and tea

In a typical Chinese city the supermarkets put out massive Spring Festival displays starting in January. Bright red is the dominant colour everywhere — red bags, red boxes, red wrapping, red signage. The 年货 (nián huò) sections of major supermarkets like RT-Mart, Wumart, or local chains turn into seasonal events of their own.

Online shopping has eaten a growing share of it. The big platforms run dedicated Spring Festival campaigns — Taobao’s 年货节 (nián huò jié, New Year Goods Festival) kicks off in mid-January, with Pinduoduo and JD.com close behind. Parents and grandparents now order everything from nut-and-candy gift boxes to whole frozen fish for the eve dinner, delivered to the door.

Read on: Why Money Trees Show Up Around Chinese New Year

Spring Couplets

春联 (chūn lián, spring couplets) are pairs of vertical red-paper strips with black or gold calligraphy, pasted on either side of a doorway, with a horizontal banner above. The couplets are short auspicious phrases that pair grammatically — one side starts a thought, the other completes it.

A common example:

• Right side: 春风春雨春常在 (chūn fēng chūn yǔ chūn cháng zài) — Spring breeze, spring rain, spring is always here
• Left side: 喜气喜事喜人间 (xǐ qì xǐ shì xǐ rén jiān) — Joy in the air, joy in events, joy among people
• Top banner: 万事如意 (wàn shì rú yì) — May all things go as you wish

Most urban Chinese families today buy printed couplets at the market rather than write their own. Bank branches and supermarkets hand them out as customer gifts. A small subculture of calligraphy enthusiasts still writes them by hand, and elderly relatives in some families maintain the tradition.

I was one of those kids. I practised calligraphy growing up — mostly 楷书 (kǎi shū, regular script) and 隶书 (lì shū, clerical script) — so couplets weren’t decorations to me, they were homework that ended up on doors. Before each new year, my family would lay out red paper, brushes, and ink. Most calligraphers use black ink. I always reached for metallic gold because it caught the light against the red.

My grandfather would ask me to write couplets, and sometimes hand mine out to neighbours and relatives. A handwritten couplet isn’t just decoration — it’s a blessing in someone’s actual handwriting that they paste on their own door. Seeing my writing on a neighbour’s door is one of the strongest Spring Festival memories I have.

By the night of the eve, almost every front door in a Chinese residential block will have couplets up.

The Upside-Down Fu Character

The single character 福 (fú, fortune or good luck) is also pasted on doors during CNY — usually as a red diamond-shaped paper. Almost always, it’s pasted upside down.

The reason is a homophone wordplay. 倒 (dào, upside down) is pronounced exactly the same as 到 (dào, to arrive), so an upside-down 福 (fú) symbolically says good fortune has arrived.

There’s a small subtlety: most front doors get the upside-down 福 (fú). But on certain interior spaces — particularly inside main living rooms or family ancestral shrines — some traditional families paste 福 right-side up. The logic is that you want the formal entrance to welcome arriving fortune and the inside of the home to hold steady fortune. Most modern families don’t follow these distinctions strictly.

New Clothes — and the Adidas/Nike Phenomenon

Tradition says: wear new clothes on the first day of the new year, especially something red. A new outfit symbolises the fresh start; red wards off bad luck.

The modern version is recognisable to anyone in any major city around the world. Major sportswear brands — Adidas, Nike, Li-Ning, Anta — release Lunar New Year collections every year, typically with red colourways, zodiac-themed embroidery, and limited-edition packaging. The Year of the Dragon 2024 saw collaborations across nearly every major Western brand operating in Asia. The Goat year 2027 will likely see similar product drops.

For some Chinese consumers — especially Gen Z in tier-1 cities — buying a new pair of Lunar New Year sneakers or a Spring Festival capsule jacket is now part of how the new clothes tradition is observed. The function is identical to what their grandparents did with a tailor-made red cotton jacket: a deliberate purchase that marks the new year. The cultural form has shifted from tailored fabric to brand drops, but the impulse is consistent.

Read on: How to Choose Your Size When Buying Clothes or Shoes from China

For those abroad who want to bring something to a CNY gathering — a red sweater, a small red accessory, or a Lunar New Year edition item from a brand they already wear — it’s appropriate and appreciated. Wearing all black or all white on Day 1 is the misstep to avoid; both are funeral colours in Chinese tradition.

A friend who teaches kindergarten in Hangzhou described her Spring Festival shopping list for 2025 — couplets, candy, gifts for the in-laws, frozen dumplings for the slow-cooker, and a pair of Adidas Year of the Snake trainers for her six-year-old. The trainers were what the child cared about. The couplets were what her mother cared about. Both got bought.

New Year’s Eve: The Most Important Night

If you ask any Chinese family which day of Spring Festival matters most, the answer isn’t Day 1. It’s the night before — 除夕 (Chú Xī, New Year’s Eve). In 2027 this falls on Friday, February 5.

Almost everything important in Spring Festival happens on this single night.

The Reunion Dinner

The 年夜饭 (nián yè fàn, reunion dinner) is the cultural centre of CNY. The closest Western feeling is Christmas Eve — the one night a year when generations gather around a single table, no matter how far anyone had to travel. Family members who live in other cities travel days to be there.

The meaning is in the word 团圆 (tuán yuán, round and complete). Everyone present, no one missing. The Chinese phrase for being a complete family on this night carries weight that’s hard to translate.

When I was a kid, the eve was the day I looked forward to most. My parents balanced both sides of the family — lunch at my paternal grandparents’ (奶奶, nǎi nai), dinner at my maternal grandparents’ (外婆, wài pó) — so both grandmothers got the full house. The food mattered, but what I waited for was the cousins. We only saw each other a few times a year because of school. The eve was the one afternoon we got all to ourselves.

The dinners were entirely homemade then. Aunts, uncles, and grandmothers cooked together for two days straight. The table would be loaded with twenty or thirty dishes — far more than anyone could finish, which was the point. The leftovers were 年年有余 (nián nián yǒu yú, surplus year after year) made literal.

The dishes I waited for: 蒸鱼 (zhēng yú, steamed fish), 肉丸子 (ròu wán zi, meatballs), 鸡爪 (jī zhǎo, chicken feet — for the collagen, I’d eat a handful at a time), and 炒鱿鱼 (chǎo yóu yú, stir-fried squid). 炒鱿鱼 isn’t actually auspicious — the idiom means to fire someone from a job — but coastal families just eat what they like.

While the adults played 麻将 (má jiàng, mahjong) before dinner and watched the 春晚 (chūnwǎn, CCTV Gala) after, the kids played Chinese chess and Chinese checkers, or ran around the apartment until someone called us back to the table.

That kind of 年味 (nián wèi, the flavour of the new year) — the feeling that this day was genuinely different from any other — is harder to find now. Restaurants do reunion dinners. Cousins live in different cities. Mahjong tables fold earlier. But the shape is still recognisable to anyone who grew up with it.

Read on: Choosing a Mahjong Set for Home Games

A traditional reunion dinner is usually built around a large shared meal served around a round table. The number of dishes varies widely. A small nuclear family might prepare only five or six dishes, while a large extended family, a restaurant banquet, or a Cantonese-style feast can easily include more than a dozen. Northern and southern Chinese families also eat very differently, and many younger families now rely on restaurant bookings, delivery, or ready-made festival dishes. The exact dishes vary enormously by region, but many families still include symbolic foods associated with luck, prosperity, abundance, and family unity.

• Fish (鱼, yú) — sounds the same as 余 (yú, surplus). Saying 年年有余 (nián nián yǒu yú, every year a surplus) means may there always be more than enough. The fish is usually served whole, head and tail intact. In some families it’s traditional not to finish the fish, leaving a portion to symbolise abundance for the year ahead.
• Dumplings (饺子, jiǎozi) — shaped like ancient Chinese silver ingots called 元宝 (yuán bǎo). Symbolise wealth. Eaten throughout the North; less common in the South.
• Spring rolls (春卷, chūn juǎn) — gold colour resembles gold bars. Symbolic wealth.
• Glutinous rice cake (年糕, nián gāo) — puns on 年高 (nián gāo, year higher, or rise each year). Strong tradition in the South.
• Long noodles (长寿面, cháng shòu miàn) — longevity noodles. Eaten in some regions on the eve or Day 1, not on the eve itself in others.
• Chicken (鸡, jī) — sounds like 吉 (jí, good fortune). Often served whole.

Ancestor Offerings Before the Reunion Dinner

In more traditional households, the reunion dinner may begin with ancestor worship rather than eating. Families place food, tea, wine, fruit, incense, or paper offerings before ancestral tablets, portraits, or a home altar. In this sense, the ancestors eat first, and only after the ritual does the living family sit down for the meal.

Some families may also set out bowls and chopsticks as part of the offering, but this should not be confused with a universal rule that every reunion table has an empty ancestral seat. Practices vary widely by region, religion, dialect group, and family background. Cantonese, Hokkien, Teochew, and many overseas Chinese families often maintain more visible ancestor rituals at home, while many younger urban families — especially in northern cities — may observe them more lightly, privately, or not at all.

Staying Up — Shou Sui

After dinner, the family stays together — 守岁 (shǒu suì, guarding the year). The traditional reason was to ward off the mythical Nian beast that supposedly came out at midnight. The modern reason is that the family wants to see the new year arrive together.

Today, staying up most often means staying together to watch the Chunwan (春晚, chūnwǎn, CCTV Spring Festival Gala). The Gala has aired continuously since 1983 and is often described as one of the most-watched television broadcasts in the world. It runs from around 8 p.m. until after midnight — a sprawling mix of patriotic segments, celebrity appearances, comedy sketches, dance performances, and pop songs.

For younger Chinese people who cannot go home for the holiday — especially students, migrants, and overseas workers — staying up may look very different. Instead of sitting around the family television, they might meet friends for hotpot, go to a public countdown, watch fireworks in places like Hong Kong or Sydney, and then head out after midnight. It is less traditional, but the emotional logic is similar: you do not want to enter the new year alone.

For more on the 2027-specific holiday calendar and what to expect day-by-day, see Chinese New Year 2027: The Year of the Fire Goat.

The First Seven Days, by Day

The festival traditionally lasts 15 days, although most modern Chinese families actively celebrate only the first 3 to 5 days. The day-by-day structure below reflects the traditional pattern; how closely any family follows it depends on region, generation, religion, and personal observance.

Day 1 — The New Year Begins

The first day is for visiting elders. Grown children visit their parents and grandparents. Younger members give greetings, receive red envelopes, and eat together. No sweeping, no washing of hair, no breaking of dishes. Wear new clothes, especially red.

Traditionally, married daughters do not visit their parents’ home on Day 1 — that visit is usually reserved for Day 2.

Day 2 — Daughters Return Home

Day 2 is 回娘家 (huí niáng jiā, returning to mother’s home) — married daughters return to their parents’ home with their husbands and children. In some families this is when the wife’s side of the family hosts a major meal.

This is a significant tradition because in Chinese tradition, daughters historically married out of their original family. Day 2 is the formal day they return as a guest with their new family unit.

Day 3 — Red Mouth Day

Day 3 — 赤口日 (chì kǒu rì, red mouth day) — is traditionally considered an unlucky day for socialising. Old superstition holds that arguments and friction are likely. Many traditional families avoid visiting friends on Day 3. Stay home. Eat leftovers.

Most younger urban Chinese ignore this and treat it as a normal holiday day.

Day 4 — Welcoming the Kitchen God

The Kitchen God — 灶神 (zào shén) — is said to leave the household for the heavens before CNY to report on the family’s behaviour over the past year. Day 4 is when he returns. Some rural families and traditional households make offerings at the kitchen stove to welcome him back.

This tradition is mostly observed in rural and elderly households now. It’s not commonly visible in urban tier-1 city households.

Day 5 — Breaking Five

破五 (Pò Wǔ, breaking the five). This is the day when many of the Day 1 taboos lift. You can sweep, take out the trash, and resume normal household activity. Many businesses traditionally reopen on Day 5.

In northern China, dumplings are eaten on Day 5. It’s also a day associated with the God of Wealth — many shopkeepers traditionally light firecrackers (where allowed) to welcome wealth into the new year’s business.

Days 6 and 7

Day 6 is a quieter day for visits to more distant relatives. Day 7 is 人日 (rén rì, everyone’s birthday). In older traditions, it was symbolically treated as the shared birthday of humanity, and in some regions people were considered to have collectively aged by one year on this day. Some Chinese communities, especially in Singapore and Malaysia, mark Day 7 with yusheng (魚生, yúshēng), a raw-fish prosperity salad traditionally tossed together in a ritual known in Cantonese as lo hei (tossing up good fortune) — but more on this in the regional section below.

Days 8 through 14

The middle period of the festival quiets down. Migrant workers return to their cities. Children and university students may still be on break. Businesses are open. The tempo is slower than Day 1 but the holiday hasn’t ended.

Day 15 — Lantern Festival

The festival officially closes on 元宵节 (Yuánxiāo Jié, Lantern Festival) — the first full moon of the lunar year. On Saturday, February 20, 2027, this is when:

• Families eat 汤圆 (tāng yuán, glutinous rice balls in sweet broth) — round shape symbolises family unity
• Cities hold lantern displays, often elaborate
• Some regions hold lantern riddle games — 猜灯谜 (cāi dēng mí, guessing lantern riddles)
• Couples traditionally go out to admire lanterns — Lantern Festival also carried romantic associations in older Chinese society because it was one of the few nights when young unmarried women could publicly go out to admire lantern displays. For this reason, some writers loosely describe it as an early form of Chinese Valentine’s Day.

After Lantern Festival, the Spring Festival period is generally considered over and normal life fully resumes.

Chinese New Year Traditions by day — quick reference

Day 1: Visit elders, give greetings, no sweeping

Day 2: Married daughters visit their parents

Day 3: Stay home (red mouth day)

Day 4: Welcome the Kitchen God

Day 5: Break taboos, businesses reopen, eat dumplings (in the North)

Day 7: Everyone’s Birthday — eat raw-fish salad in some regions

Day 15: Lantern Festival — eat tang yuan, see lanterns

Red Envelopes

Red envelopes — 红包 (hóngbāo) — are given on Day 1: from older to younger, employer to staff, and the husband’s family to a new daughter-in-law on her first CNY. Over the past decade, digital red envelopes on WeChat and Alipay have largely replaced paper for adult-to-adult and long-distance giving, while paper still dominates for handing to kids in person.

For amounts, lucky numbers, taboos, digital mechanics, and where to buy, see the full guide: The Red Envelope: Meaning, Money, Etiquette & Where to Buy.

The Big Public Stuff: Dances, Temple Fairs, and Firecrackers

The visible, public face of CNY — the part foreign tourists come to see — has its own set of traditions. Most are still strong; some have been modernised; some are in transition.

Lion Dance and Dragon Dance

Lion dance — 舞狮 (wǔ shī) — is usually performed by two dancers inside a colourful lion costume, accompanied by drums, gongs, and cymbals. During the traditional cai qing (采青) ritual, the lion grabs lettuce or greens hung from shopfronts or doorways and spits them back out, symbolising the spreading of wealth and good fortune. Lion dances are commonly performed outside businesses during the first days of the Lunar New Year.

Dragon dance — 舞龙 (wǔ lóng) — a long dragon body manipulated by a team of performers on poles, moving as if it were a single creature. The dragon symbolises good fortune and power.

Both are common at:

• Major temples during the festival
• Chinatown areas globally (San Francisco, London, Sydney, Manchester)
• Shopping mall opening events
• Some workplaces — companies hire troupes to perform on the first day of work after the holiday

The performances are usually free to watch in public; the troupes are tipped or paid by the venues hosting them.

Temple Fairs

庙会 (miào huì, temple fairs) are open-air markets held at major Buddhist or Daoist temples during the Spring Festival period. They combine food stalls, traditional craft demonstrations, opera or storytelling performances, and folk games.

Beijing’s Ditan Temple Fair and Longtan Temple Fair are among the best-known in northern China, while southern cities and temple areas also hold large festive gatherings during the holiday period. For many urban residents, Spring Festival fairs are one of the few opportunities to experience traditional folk performances, snacks, crafts, and holiday customs in one place.

For foreign visitors, temple fairs are usually the most accessible tourist-friendly CNY experience — crowded, but full of food and activity in a focused space.

If you like 热闹 (rè nao) — the warm, loud, crowded kind of liveliness that Chinese culture treats as a good thing rather than a nuisance — a temple fair is the most concentrated dose of it you’ll find. Worth planning around if you’re ever in China during the festival.

Firecrackers and Fireworks — the Changing Soundscape

Traditional CNY had two sound profiles. Inside the home: the clatter of cooking, conversation, the Chunwan playing. Outside, especially at midnight on the eve and on Day 5: an unrelenting hours-long wave of firecrackers and fireworks.

Firework rules now vary significantly across the Chinese-speaking world.

• Mainland tier-1 cities (Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen): Fireworks are heavily restricted or banned in central urban areas. Some suburban or outer districts may still allow them during parts of the Spring Festival period.
• Tier-2 and tier-3 cities: Rules vary by location and may change from year to year. Some places allow fireworks only in designated areas or during specific time windows.
• Smaller cities, county towns, and rural areas: Fireworks are still widely used during Lunar New Year, although local governments may impose limits on timing, noise, or fire safety.
• Hong Kong and Singapore: Personal fireworks are generally banned. Large-scale public displays and official festival events are the main alternatives.
• Public opinion: The restrictions remain controversial. Some argue that fireworks are part of the atmosphere and cultural character of Lunar New Year, while others support the rules because of concerns about air pollution, injuries, and fire risk.

For visitors hoping to experience CNY with the traditional fireworks, smaller cities and rural areas in mainland China remain the place. The big city experience now leans toward organised public displays and family-focused indoor traditions.

Regional Differences: It’s Not One Holiday

Chinese New Year is not a single uniform tradition. The same holiday looks meaningfully different depending on where you are in the Chinese-speaking world.

Northern China vs Southern China

This is the most basic regional divide and the one most visible in food and decorations.

For many northern families, Lunar New Year’s Eve without dumplings would feel incomplete. In some southern households, however, dumplings are seen primarily as a northern-style food rather than a core part of local New Year traditions.

Hong Kong

Hong Kong CNY traditions reflect Cantonese cultural heritage and the city’s history as a British colony.

• Greeting: Cantonese 恭喜發財 (gong hei fat choi, wishing prosperity) is widely used. 新年快樂 (san nin faai lok, Happy New Year) is also common.
• Fireworks: The Victoria Harbour Lunar New Year fireworks display is one of Hong Kong’s major public celebrations and is often held on the second day of the Lunar New Year, though the exact arrangement can vary by year.
• Horse racing: The Chinese New Year Race Day at Sha Tin is a major Hong Kong tradition and social event during the holiday period.
• Red envelope norms: Lai see amounts are often modest for non-immediate family, neighbours, service workers, and workplace acquaintances, with small notes such as 20, 50, or 100 HKD commonly used depending on the relationship.
• Lai see custom: In Hong Kong, married adults commonly give 利是 (lai see, red envelopes) to younger or unmarried relatives, children, and sometimes unmarried colleagues or workplace juniors after returning to work. This office custom is much more visible in Hong Kong than in mainland China.

One distinctly Cantonese custom: 观音借库 (Guān yīn jiè kù, borrowing from Guanyin’s treasury). On the 26th day of the first lunar month — the day the bodhisattva Guanyin is said to open her treasury — believers visit Guanyin temples (Hung Hom Kwun Yum Temple is the most famous in Hong Kong) to symbolically borrow fortune for the year ahead. Tradition holds that the loan should be repaid — 还库 (huán kù) — at the end of the lunar year, and many believers continue the cycle for three consecutive years. It’s mainly a Hong Kong, Macau, and Guangdong practice; you won’t really see it in northern China.

Singapore and Malaysia

Singapore and Malaysia have their own CNY personality, shaped by the predominantly Hokkien, Teochew, Cantonese, and Hakka heritage of their Chinese communities.

• Lo Hei / Yu Sheng: 撈起 (Lo Hei, lāo qǐ, tossing up) or 魚生 is a signature Singaporean and Malaysian Chinese New Year tradition. It is a festive raw-fish salad with shredded vegetables, sauces, and toppings. Everyone at the table tosses the salad together with chopsticks while saying auspicious phrases. The higher the toss, the better the luck.
• Regional identity: Lo Hei is not a mainstream Lunar New Year custom in mainland China. It is strongly associated with the Chinese communities of Singapore and Malaysia, with both countries connected to its modern form.
• Mandarin oranges: Guests often bring or exchange mandarin oranges, usually in pairs, when visiting during the New Year.
• Singapore public events: River Hongbao and the Chingay Parade are among Singapore’s best-known public Lunar New Year celebrations.
• Lunar New Year is a two-day public holiday in Singapore and Malaysia (Feb 6–7 in 2027).

Vietnam — Tết

Vietnamese New Year, Tết Nguyên Đán, usually falls on the same date as Chinese New Year, although calendar differences can occasionally create a different date. Tết shares some broad Lunar New Year themes, such as family reunion, ancestral offerings, and red envelopes, known as lì xì in Vietnamese.

However, Tết is a separate Vietnamese cultural tradition, not simply a Vietnamese version of Chinese New Year. It has its own foods, symbols, and customs, including bánh chưng, a square sticky rice cake closely associated with the holiday.

Superstitions and Taboos: What NOT to Do

The taboos are sincerely observed by some families and humoured as folk practice by others. If you’re a guest, follow your host’s lead. Here are the most common ones:

On Day 1 Specifically

• Don’t sweep or take out trash — you’d sweep away the year’s good luck. Some families keep brooms hidden until Day 2
• Don’t wash your hair — washes away luck. Same applies to laundry in some households
• Don’t break dishes — symbolises breaking the year’s harmony. If a dish breaks, immediately say 碎碎平安 (suì suì píng ān), which puns on a phrase meaning peace year after year
• Don’t use scissors or knives — symbolic of cutting the year’s good fortune
• Don’t say unlucky words — death, sickness, ghost, poor, broken. Some families strictly enforce this with children

Throughout the Festival Period

• Don’t lend or borrow money — sets the tone of debt for the year
• Don’t go to the doctor unless urgent — symbolises a year of illness
• Don’t wear all black or all white — funeral colours
• Don’t visit a hospital, attend a funeral, or go to graveyards — bad luck association
• Don’t return home empty-handed — bring fruits, sweets, or symbolic gifts when visiting relatives
• Don’t gift these items: clocks (送钟, sòng zhōng — sounds like attending a funeral), shoes (sounds like the word for evil), umbrellas (the word sounds like to scatter or to break up), pears (sounds like to separate)

Further reading: Common Chinese Superstitions Still Believed Today

What 2027 Visitors Should Know

For travellers visiting China during CNY 2027, the taboos to actually take seriously are:

• Don’t wear all-black to a family CNY dinner — it reads as funeral attire
• Don’t give a clock as a gift to a Chinese host
• If invited to a CNY meal, bring fruit, sweets, or a quality tea — not flowers, which often have funereal associations
• Don’t initiate conversations about politically sensitive topics, deaths in the family, or financial hardship at the table — CNY is for forward-looking, lucky speech

For a deeper breakdown of what to do and what to avoid at a Chinese table — beyond just CNY — see Chinese Table Manners: What’s Actually Expected in 2027.

Visiting family? The Shoes-Off Custom Explained

How Modern China Actually Celebrates

Most CNY guides describe traditions in their idealised form — what people are supposed to do. What people actually do in 2026 and 2027 is layered with smartphones, generation gaps, and city-rural divides.

The Chunwan Is On, But No One’s Really Watching

The Spring Festival Gala — 春晚 (chūnwǎn) — is still the cultural backbone of the eve. Almost every household has it on. The viewing experience has changed completely. Younger family members watch Douyin on their phones with the Gala in the background. Older relatives watch attentively. The result is a four-hour family hangout where the TV is the room’s ambient sound.

Critics and viewers roast the Gala in real time on Weibo, and by midnight, compilation videos of the night’s best and worst moments are already circulating online. CCTV’s New Year Gala still draws enormous audiences, but for many younger viewers it now functions more as background atmosphere than must-watch television — part of the soundscape of Lunar New Year rather than the centre of attention.

Reverse Spring Festival Migration

The traditional Spring Festival migration — 春运 (chūn yùn) — sees hundreds of millions of urban workers return to their hometowns and remains the world’s largest annual human migration, with hundreds of millions of railway passenger journeys taking place during the roughly 40-day travel period.

A decade ago, 春运 (chūn yùn) was closer to an ordeal than a journey. Too many people moving the same direction in the same two-week window. The drive from Guangzhou to Changsha — normally seven or eight hours — could swell past fifteen when the highways clogged. Taking leave a few days early didn’t help; you’d sit in the same jam as everyone with the same idea. Friends carpooled with strangers. Others stood the entire train ride home because seated tickets had sold out. When traffic was at its worst, people half-joked you could get through most of a TV drama you’d been meaning to watch without moving more than a few kilometres. Tickets were either impossible to find or absurdly expensive. None of it was exaggerated — it’s what a generation of migrant workers went through, year after year, to make it home.

Increasingly common: 反向春运 (fǎn xiàng chūn yùn, reverse Spring Festival travel) — younger urban professionals fly their parents to their city for the holiday instead. The reasons are practical: train tickets to a tier-1 city in the off-peak direction are cheaper and easier to get, the apartment is bigger than the parents’ rural home, and city restaurants take cooking pressure off. The trend has grown steadily through the 2020s.

A side effect: tier-1 cities used to feel half-empty during CNY because everyone went home. They still quiet down — but less than a decade ago.

The Marriage Interrogation, and How Gen Z Is Dodging It

CNY reunites generations that don’t otherwise see each other. For unmarried adults in their late 20s and 30s, this almost always includes pointed questions from relatives about marriage prospects.

A small industry has grown up around this pressure. Thanks to the sharing economy, you can now rent a stand-in partner for the holiday — 租男友 / 租女友 (zū nán yǒu / zū nǚ yǒu, rent-a-boyfriend / rent-a-girlfriend) services get media coverage every CNY. The actual market is small and probably overstated. The anxiety it points to is not.

The more common move is simpler: don’t go home. Plenty of young people grinding away in big cities skip the trip entirely to avoid the questions. And there’s a clear generational split in how people handle it. Many 80s- and 90s-born adults still feel a pull of guilt about dodging family — they go home and endure it. The post-2000s generation tends to be more matter-of-fact. A lot of them just stay in their own apartment, skip the relative visits, and sidestep the whole thing without apology.

Paying New Year Visits

拜年 (bài nián, paying New Year visits) used to mean knocking on doors. A lot of it happens on video now. People send 短视频拜年 (duǎn shì pín bài nián, short-video New Year greetings) — a quick clip of themselves wishing you well — over WeChat or Douyin, especially to relatives they can’t reach in person. Older relatives forward elaborate animated blessing videos; younger people send a five-second selfie clip. The gesture survived. The doorstep didn’t.

The Generational Shift in Drinking Culture

Old CNY drinking culture — forced 白酒 (bái jiǔ) toasts, 干杯 (gān bēi, bottoms up) rounds, the obligatory glass with each elder around the table — has been quietly declining among younger Chinese.

In a 2021 poll by China Newsweek aimed at young people, more than 600,000 voted on how they felt about drinking-table culture. About 84.7% chose the strongest option available: extremely averse, cannot accept (poll). It’s younger Chinese who push back hardest — the generations now entering the workforce, who increasingly refuse to treat the toast as obligatory.

The 2027 reunion dinner in many families may still include alcohol — but increasingly with tea, soft drinks, or low-alcohol alternatives as acceptable substitutes. The shift is generational and gradual. Older relatives in some families still push 白酒 (bái jiǔ). Younger members increasingly opt out without making a scene.

Modern China note

The traditions that survive in 2027 are the ones that still work as ways to feel connected to family. The reunion dinner survived. The Day 3 superstition mostly didn’t. Red envelopes survived (in digital form). Forced drinking is dying. The pattern isn’t random — what stays is what means something.

Chinese New Year Traditions for Kids: A Practical Approach

For families introducing CNY to children — whether second-generation Chinese diaspora kids, mixed-heritage families, or non-Chinese families wanting to celebrate respectfully — here’s the workable starter set:

What to Do

• Read a children’s book about the Nian beast myth — most libraries have one around Lunar New Year, and there are also bilingual Chinese-English versions with pinyin available on Amazon. The story explains why red, loud noises, and firecrackers became associated with the holiday.
• Make paper cuts together — simple red paper, basic scissors, designs are forgiving. Lots of free templates online
• Play a traditional board game together — Chinese chess and Chinese checkers are both kid-friendly and widely available.
• Cook dumplings as a family activity — folding dumplings is a tactile group activity that kids love. Don’t worry about technique; the experience is the point
• Give small red envelopes — even with token amounts (a coin, a small bill, a chocolate coin). The format matters more than the content for kids
• Wear something red on Day 1 — a sweater, a hair clip, socks. Easy and visible
• Watch a CNY-themed short film together — Pixar’s Bao (2018) works beautifully for younger kids
• Learn three phrases — 新年快乐 (Xīn nián kuài lè, Happy New Year), 恭喜发财 (Gōng xǐ fā cái, Prosperity), 谢谢 (Xiè xie, Thank you) for receiving a 红包 (hóngbāo)

What to Skip

• Don’t try to recreate the eight-course reunion dinner unless your family wants to. Two or three CNY-symbolic dishes is plenty
• Don’t enforce taboos as rules — frame them as cultural customs and let kids decide
• Don’t worry about getting every tradition perfect — most Chinese families are flexible and combine traditions from multiple generations and regions

For deeper language learning around the holiday — what to say, when, and to whom — see How to Say Happy New Year in Chinese: 30+ Phrases by Context.

Frequently Asked Questions

What to Take Away

Chinese New Year traditions in 2027 are a layered thing. Some go back two or three thousand years and look largely the way they did in the Tang dynasty. Some emerged in the past decade and would baffle a Tang person. Some traditions that were universal a generation ago are now optional or quietly dropping out.

The version that survives — and the version that matters — is the one that still does the cultural work: family connection, fresh start, ancestral remembrance, transition into a new year. Everything else is form. The forms shift. The function holds.

New here? Stellar Chinese explains modern China the way someone who grew up with it would — the gold-ink couplets, the two-grandmother dinner circuit, the chicken feet eaten by the handful. If that’s the China you want explained, the rest of this series goes deeper into the parts most guides skip.