The list of blocked websites in China – Updated 2015

You probably already know that sites such as Facebook, Youtube or Google.com are blocked in China and that the only way to access them is with a VPN.

But what about the other hundreds of web sites that we normally use?

Are we sure that they’ll work in China?

One of the most frequent questions we receive is if a certain website or app, such as Dropbox Google Play, is blocked in China.

In this article we’ll list all web sites, which at the moment, don’t work beyond the Great Firewall of China, or the system developed by the Ministry of Public Security, (MPS) to control access to websites considered “dangerous” for Chinese citizens.

Which websites are blocked in China?

Here’s a list of the most popular websites which, at the moment, are blocked in China:

Social

Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, WordPress.com, Blogspot, Blogger, Flickr, SoundCloud, Google+, Google Hangouts, Hootsuite.

Apps

Google Play (this means that without a VPN you won’t be able to download any apps from Google Play), Line, KaKao Talk.

Search engines

Google (both Google.com and the majority of local versions like Google.com.hk, Google.fr, etcetera), Bing, Duck Duck Go, various foreign versions of Baidu and Yahoo.

Media

The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, Reuters, LeMonde, L’Equipe (What do they have against the French?), Netflix, Youtube, Vimeo, Google News, Daily Motion, many pages of Wikipedia, Wikileaks.

Work tools

Google Drive, Google Docs, Gmail, Google Calendar (generally all Google services), Dropbox, ShutterStock, iStockPhotos, WayBackMachine, Scribd, Xing, Android, and many VPN sites.

Porn

Porn sites are almost all blocked; I don’t know of any exceptions.

What can you tell me about Chinese sites?

Chinese sites, in general, all work and moreover are extremely fast. Note that, if you’re using a VPN, some Chinese sites will not work correctly (for example many of the videos on Youku won’t be available). This is caused by the fact that some sites work only in China and, by turning on a VPN, you are “masking” your Chinese IP address with that of another country.

And if the site I’m interested in isn’t on this list?

The list published in this article is not exhaustive and bear in mind that the situation is constantly changing – a site that’s blocked today could work tomorrow – as well as just the opposite – a site that works today could stop working within twenty minutes.

To verify if a given website is blocked just insert the URL in the “Test URL” search bar on Greatfire.org.

In addition, there are sites that are partially blocked (on Wikipedia for example some pages work perfectly while others don’t work at all), sites that go on and off and sites that despite not being blocked, are so slow that in a practical sense they’re unusable. The classic example is making video-calls on Skype: the connection is often so slow that you’ll want to skip the call.

Is there a solution or do I have to resign myself?
Source: http://www.saporedicina.com/english/list-of-blocked-websites-in-china/