[m0th87]

You can also just use a phone plan with roaming, as they aren't affected by the firewall. The guide says it's pricey, but Google Fi doesn't charge extra for roaming. I got around China last year with it, including some fairly remote parts.

[derefr]

Or stop by Hong Kong first and get your SIM there (from a mainland ISP.) Because it's a mainland ISP, you'll have coverage anywhere in China without roaming; and since the SIM was issued for Hong Kong, it won't route through the Great Firewall, even when in the mainland.

[nneonneo]

FWIW, I went to China last week, and sadly found out that Google Fi doesn't (yet?) support tethering while roaming on iOS. It's an annoying restriction; I worked around it with a local SOCKS5 proxy running on my iPhone, but I would have preferred not to have to hack around it at all.

To be fair, having an iPhone and Fi automatically makes me a bit of a second-class citizen with Fi, but hey, it's the cheapest way for me to have international roaming.

[echevil]

+1 on Google Fi. I go back to China every year and Google Fi works out well.