Delta Law Expat Services Desk ｜ Law of the People's Republic of China on the Application of Law to Foreign-Related Civil Relations（《中华人民共和国涉外民事关系法律适用法》）, adopted 2010-10-28, in force from 2011-04-01, articles 31 to 35, read with the succession part of the Civil Code.
- Chinese conflict rules do not treat an estate as a single unit. Article 31 sends intestate succession to the law of the deceased's habitual residence at death, but immovable property to the law of the place where it is located.
- Articles 32 and 33 use different connecting factors. The form of a will is valid if it satisfies any one of three laws; its validity is governed by only two, and the law of the place where the will was made is not among them.
- Article 34 sends administration of the estate to the law of the place where the estate is located — which, for assets in China, routes the question back to articles 1145 to 1149 of the Civil Code.
- Where foreign law cannot be ascertained, article 10, paragraph 2 applies Chinese law. Renvoi is excluded by article 9.
- Two overrides sit above all of this: mandatory Chinese rules apply directly (article 4), and foreign law is displaced where it would harm the public interest (article 5).
1. The documents at a glance
| Item | Content |
|---|---|
| Full title | Law of the People's Republic of China on the Application of Law to Foreign-Related Civil Relations（《中华人民共和国涉外民事关系法律适用法》）, chapter 4 (Succession), read with the Civil Code of the People's Republic of China（《中华人民共和国民法典》） |
| Document number | Adopted at the 17th session of the Standing Committee of the Eleventh National People's Congress. The presidential order number is not stated on the official pages consulted for this page（官方未载明） |
| Adopted / promulgated | 2010-10-28 |
| Current version in force from | 2011-04-01 (article 52). The Civil Code has been in force from 2021-01-01 |
| Issuing authority | Standing Committee of the National People's Congress |
| Official text | http://gongbao.court.gov.cn/Details/5556b6c60575c047bb77100af04a09.html and https://www.court.gov.cn/zixun/xiangqing/233181.html |
| What this page covers | Which law governs each question when a foreign national dies holding assets in China, and where that answer is routed back into Chinese substantive law. |
2. The map: five articles, five different questions
The single most useful thing to know about Chinese succession conflict rules is that they are not one rule. Chapter 4 of the Law splits the subject into five questions and answers each with its own connecting factor. Reading them as a block, or assuming that "the law of the deceased's home country governs the estate", produces the wrong answer more often than not.
| Question | Governing law | Article |
|---|---|---|
| Intestate succession — movables | Law of the deceased's habitual residence at death | Art. 31 |
| Intestate succession — immovables | Law of the place where the immovable is located | Art. 31 |
| Form of a will | Valid if it satisfies any one of: habitual residence, nationality, or the place where the will was made — tested at the time of making or at death | Art. 32 |
| Validity of a will | Law of habitual residence or of nationality, at the time of making or at death | Art. 33 |
| Administration of the estate and related matters | Law of the place where the estate is located | Art. 34 |
| Ownerless estate | Law of the place where the estate is located at the deceased's death | Art. 35 |
3. Intestate succession: one death, potentially two governing laws
第三十一条 法定继承，适用被继承人死亡时经常居所地法律，但不动产法定继承，适用不动产所在地法律。
Article 31: Intestate succession is governed by the law of the place of habitual residence of the deceased at the time of death, save that intestate succession to immovable property is governed by the law of the place where the immovable property is located.
Unofficial translation; the Chinese text as officially published prevails.
This is a scission system: the estate is split by the nature of the asset, and each part takes its own law. For a foreign national who dies habitually resident abroad but owning an apartment in Shanghai, intestate succession to that apartment is governed by Chinese law, while succession to bank balances, shares and other movables is governed by the law of the last habitual residence. Two different sets of heirs, shares and reserved-portion rules can therefore apply to one estate, and neither displaces the other.
For a reader from a common law jurisdiction the second half of article 31 is the more familiar part — the situs rule for land is widely shared. The unfamiliar part is the first half: the connecting factor for movables is habitual residence at death, not nationality and not domicile as those terms are understood elsewhere. A long-term resident of Shanghai who has never changed nationality may well have a Chinese habitual residence, in which case Chinese law governs the movable estate as well. Article 31 also speaks only to intestate succession; where there is a will, the analysis moves to articles 32 and 33 and the will's terms are tested there.
4. Wills: form and validity are answered by different rules
第三十二条 遗嘱方式，符合遗嘱人立遗嘱时或者死亡时经常居所地法律、国籍国法律或者遗嘱行为地法律的，遗嘱均为成立。
第三十三条 遗嘱效力，适用遗嘱人立遗嘱时或者死亡时经常居所地法律或者国籍国法律。
Article 32: A will is established as to form if it complies with the law of the testator's place of habitual residence, the law of the testator's nationality, or the law of the place where the will was made, taken either at the time the will was made or at the time of death. Article 33: The validity of a will is governed by the law of the testator's place of habitual residence or the law of the testator's nationality, taken either at the time the will was made or at the time of death.
Unofficial translation; the Chinese text as officially published prevails.
Compare the two lists. Article 32 offers three connecting factors and is expressly alternative — satisfy any one and the will is established as to form. Article 33 offers two, and the law of the place where the will was made is absent from it. That asymmetry is the provision most often misread, because the two articles are adjacent and look parallel. They are not: a will executed on a business trip in a third country may be formally established under article 32 by reference to the law of that country, while the question of its validity never touches that country's law at all.
Each article also carries a time element — "at the time the will was made or at the time of death" — which widens both. A testator whose habitual residence or nationality changed between execution and death has more than one candidate law under each article, not fewer. In practice this means a will that would fail under the law of a person's current habitual residence may still stand on the law that applied when it was made, and the assessment has to be done on both dates rather than only on the current position.
Two limits should be kept in view. First, articles 32 and 33 decide which law governs the will; they do not override article 31's situs rule for immovables where the will does not effectively dispose of the immovable. Second, whatever law governs, article 4 applies mandatory Chinese rules directly, and article 5 displaces a foreign law whose application would harm the public interest of China.
5. Administration: article 34 routes the work back to the Civil Code
第三十四条 遗产管理等事项，适用遗产所在地法律。
第三十五条 无人继承遗产的归属，适用被继承人死亡时遗产所在地法律。
Article 34: Administration of an estate and related matters are governed by the law of the place where the estate is located. Article 35: The devolution of an ownerless estate is governed by the law of the place where the estate is located at the time of the deceased's death.
Unofficial translation; the Chinese text as officially published prevails.
Article 34 is short and consequential. Whatever law governs who inherits, the machinery for getting there — appointment of an administrator, inventory, dealing with debts, division — is governed by the law of the place where the estate is located. For assets in China, that is Chinese law, and it applies even where the substantive succession question has been sent abroad by article 31. A family whose adviser has correctly identified a foreign succession law can still find that the administration of the China-situs assets runs on Chinese rules.
第一千一百四十五条 继承开始后，遗嘱执行人为遗产管理人；没有遗嘱执行人的，继承人应当及时推选遗产管理人；继承人未推选的，由继承人共同担任遗产管理人；没有继承人或者继承人均放弃继承的，由被继承人生前住所地的民政部门或者村民委员会担任遗产管理人。
第一千一百四十七条 遗产管理人应当履行下列职责：（一）清理遗产并制作遗产清单；（二）向继承人报告遗产情况；（三）采取必要措施防止遗产毁损、灭失；（四）处理被继承人的债权债务；（五）按照遗嘱或者依照法律规定分割遗产；（六）实施与管理遗产有关的其他必要行为。
Article 1145: On the opening of succession, the executor of the will is the estate administrator; where there is no executor, the heirs shall promptly elect an administrator; where the heirs do not elect one, they jointly act as administrator; where there are no heirs or all heirs renounce, the civil affairs department or the villagers' committee of the place of the deceased's domicile acts as administrator. Article 1147: The estate administrator shall perform the following duties: (1) take stock of the estate and prepare an inventory; (2) report on the estate to the heirs; (3) take necessary measures to prevent damage to or loss of the estate; (4) deal with the deceased's claims and debts; (5) divide the estate in accordance with the will or with law; (6) carry out other necessary acts connected with administering the estate.
Unofficial translation; the Chinese text as officially published prevails.
Three points follow for a family whose members are outside China. The default order in article 1145 is automatic: without an executor named in a will, the heirs are expected to elect an administrator, and failing that they hold the role jointly — which for heirs living in different countries is an unattractive default. Article 1146 allows an interested party to apply to a people's court to appoint an administrator where the appointment is disputed, and that is the route out of a deadlock. Article 1147 then sets six duties, of which the fourth — dealing with claims and debts — is the one that determines the order in which a China-situs estate can be dealt with at all, read with article 1159 on settling taxes and debts before division. Article 1148 attaches civil liability for loss caused by intent or gross negligence, and article 1149 permits remuneration in accordance with law or as agreed. Where no one takes the estate, article 35 of the Law sends the question to the law of the situs, which for China-situs assets is article 1160 of the Civil Code.
6. The plumbing: habitual residence, nationality and foreign law
第十九条 依照本法适用国籍国法律，自然人具有两个以上国籍的，适用有经常居所的国籍国法律；在所有国籍国均无经常居所的，适用与其有最密切联系的国籍国法律。自然人无国籍或者国籍不明的，适用其经常居所地法律。
第二十条 依照本法适用经常居所地法律，自然人经常居所地不明的，适用其现在居所地法律。
第十条 涉外民事关系适用的外国法律，由人民法院、仲裁机构或者行政机关查明。当事人选择适用外国法律的，应当提供该国法律。
不能查明外国法律或者该国法律没有规定的，适用中华人民共和国法律。
Article 19: Where the law of nationality applies under this Law and a natural person has two or more nationalities, the law of the country of nationality in which the person has a habitual residence applies; where the person has no habitual residence in any country of nationality, the law of the country of nationality with which the person has the closest connection applies. Where a natural person is stateless or the nationality is unclear, the law of the place of habitual residence applies. Article 20: Where the law of the place of habitual residence applies under this Law and that place is unclear, the law of the person's current place of residence applies. Article 10: Foreign law applicable to a foreign-related civil relation is to be ascertained by the people's court, the arbitration institution or the administrative authority. Where the parties choose to apply foreign law, they shall provide that law. Where foreign law cannot be ascertained or that law contains no relevant provision, the law of the People's Republic of China applies.
Unofficial translation; the Chinese text as officially published prevails.
These are the provisions that decide what actually happens in a contested estate. Article 19 resolves dual nationality by habitual residence first and closest connection second, and it does so without any preference for one nationality over another. Article 20 supplies a fallback where habitual residence itself cannot be established. Article 10 places the burden of ascertaining foreign law on the court, the arbitration institution or the administrative authority — but its second paragraph is the practical one: where the foreign law cannot be ascertained, Chinese law applies. Article 9 removes renvoi, so a reference to a foreign law is a reference to its substantive rules and not to its own conflict rules. The combined effect is that an estate whose foreign elements are poorly evidenced tends to be decided under Chinese law by default, and that outcome is a function of evidence, not of choice.
7. Who runs into this, and how it is used
- Misconception: the law of the deceased's home country governs the whole estate. In fact: article 31 uses habitual residence at death for movables and the situs for immovables; nationality is not the connecting factor at all.
- Misconception: a will valid where it was signed is valid in China. In fact: article 32 may establish its form by reference to the place where it was made, but article 33 does not include that law when testing validity.
- Misconception: identifying a foreign succession law settles the administration too. In fact: article 34 sends administration and related matters to the law of the place where the estate is located.
- Misconception: if no one can prove the foreign law, the matter stalls. In fact: article 10, paragraph 2 applies Chinese law where the foreign law cannot be ascertained.
- Separate the estate into immovables in China and everything else before any other analysis; article 31 makes that split the first question, not a detail.
- Assess habitual residence at death, and — where a will exists — habitual residence and nationality both at execution and at death, because articles 32 and 33 test both dates.
- Check whether the will names an executor. Without one, article 1145 of the Civil Code produces a joint administration by the heirs, which is difficult where heirs are in different countries; article 1146 provides the court route.
- Where a foreign law is expected to govern, plan how it will be evidenced under article 10, and treat the application of Chinese law as the realistic alternative if it is not.
- Keep articles 4 and 5 in view: mandatory Chinese rules apply directly, and a foreign law harmful to the public interest is displaced.
- Laws and Regulations for Foreign Nationals in China — the provision-by-provision index.
- Legacy · Wills & Succession Covering Your China Assets.
- Own · Buying Property in China as a Foreigner — why the situs rule in article 31 bites hardest on real estate.
- Born or Died in China as a Foreign National: Two Registration Duties Most People Miss (forthcoming in this batch) — the deregistration step that precedes much of this in practice.
- Money · Cross-Border Funds: China's Compliance Framework.
- 《中华人民共和国涉外民事关系法律适用法》, adopted 2010-10-28, in force from 2011-04-01: http://gongbao.court.gov.cn/Details/5556b6c60575c047bb77100af04a09.html （articles 4, 5, 9, 10, 19, 20, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 52）
- 《中华人民共和国民法典》, in force from 2021-01-01: https://www.court.gov.cn/zixun/xiangqing/233181.html （articles 1145, 1146, 1147, 1148, 1149, 1159, 1160）
- Status and timing note 效力与时点提示：Verified on 2026-09-07 against the official texts above. This page states which law governs which question; it does not assess the content of any foreign law, and it does not address succession involving residents of Hong Kong, Macao or Taiwan. Every procedural matter is subject to the current published requirements of the accepting authority.
This article is general legal research and does not constitute legal advice; by law, a law firm may not guarantee case outcomes. 本文为一般性法律研究，不构成法律意见；依据法律规定，律所不得承诺办案结果。
