The pace checker tells you whether your China plan is comfortable, busy but doable, or overloaded. It is for the evening you have written a long list of places and a quiet voice says “can we really do all this?”
What does the pace checker help you decide?
It helps you decide whether to keep, trim or stretch an itinerary before you book anything. It looks at two things: how many nights you spend in each place, and how many major sights you plan for each full day. Both matter, because a plan can fail from constant packing or from too much sightseeing.
How do you use it?
- Enter the trip length in days, counting the days you arrive and leave.
- Enter how many cities or towns you will sleep in.
- Enter how many long travel legs you have. A long leg is a journey that takes more than half a day door to door.
- Enter the total number of major sights you plan to visit.
- Say whether seniors or small children are in the group.
How do you read the result?
You get one of three verdicts and two numbers: average nights per base and sights per full day.
- Comfortable pace: there is room to rest and enjoy each place.
- Busy but doable: workable if you keep one half day free and book big sights early in the day.
- Overloaded: drop one base or one long leg. Two nights per base is a good minimum.
Each long leg costs about half a day, so the checker removes that from your count of full days. That is why a trip with many transfers looks busier than its sight list suggests. With seniors or small children, the limit on sights per day is lower.
Where do the answers come from?
Take them from your draft itinerary, not from hopes. Count sleeping places, not places you pass through. For travel time, read the timetable and add transfers and waiting. Our guide on reading train and flight times helps, and the rail vs flight tool gives the door-to-door figure.
At stations, expect X-ray bag checks, and arrive 30 to 40 minutes before departure at major stations[1]. That wait is part of the leg.
What are its limits?
It is a quick screen, not an inspection. It does not know how far apart your sights are, whether a place needs advance tickets, or how steep the paths are. Two plans with identical numbers can feel very different. A garden stroll and a mountain climb are both one sight.
What should you do next?
If the plan reads busy or overloaded, read about building rest days into an itinerary. For a longer route, test it with checking whether a multi-city route is feasible. If you travel with older parents, see pace and stamina for seniors.