Shanghai's shopping districts: which one to go to

The short answer. If you have one afternoon, walk East Nanjing Road from the Bund to People’s Square, then take Line 2 one stop to West Nanjing Road for the big malls. If you want fashion and cafés rather than department stores, go to Middle Huaihai Road and finish in Xintiandi. For souvenirs, go to Yuyuan Bazaar beside Yu Garden. For malls with a skyline view, go to Lujiazui in Pudong. The other districts below are where Shanghai people shop near home; go if you are staying nearby.

What is a “shopping district” here?

Shanghai plans its shops the way it plans its roads. The city’s commercial-space plan for 2022–2035 names 29 city-level commercial centres (市级商业中心, shìjí shāngyè zhōngxīn), the top tier below which come 45 district-level centres and many neighbourhood ones. Nineteen are near-term and ten are long-term. The plan was issued on 29 December 2022 by the city’s Commerce Commission and its Planning and Natural Resources Bureau (notice 沪商商贸〔2022〕311号; full plan, PDF). It replaced a 2014–2020 plan that named 15 such centres (city government approval, 沪府〔2014〕60号).

The plan also groups seven of the central districts into an “east international consumption cluster” around the meeting of the Huangpu River and Suzhou Creek: East and West Nanjing Road, Lujiazui, Huaihai Road, Yuyuan, the North Bund and Xujiahui. A smaller “west cluster” is built on the Hongqiao transport hub. These are the districts most visitors will see. In Chinese the word for a shopping district is 商圈 (shāngquān), literally “commerce circle”, and taxi drivers and maps use it the same way.

The districts most visitors go to

District	What it is	Metro
East Nanjing Road	Pedestrian street from the Bund to People’s Square; the old department stores	Lines 2, 10 (East Nanjing Road)
West Nanjing Road	Luxury malls from People’s Square to Jing’an Temple	Lines 2, 12, 13 (West Nanjing Road)
Middle Huaihai Road	Fashion street through the former French Concession, with Xintiandi at its east end	Lines 1, 10, 12, 13
Yuyuan Bazaar	Old-style shopping streets and tea houses beside Yu Garden	Lines 10, 14 (Yuyuan Garden)
Lujiazui–Zhangyang Road	Malls under the Pudong towers, along to Zhangyang Road	Lines 2, 14 (Lujiazui)
Xujiahui	Large 1990s malls on the old Jesuit mission lands	Lines 1, 9, 11 (Xujiahui)
North Bund	New riverside development across Suzhou Creek from the Bund	Lines 10, 12

The rest of the city-level centres

All are listed in the 2022–2035 plan. “Long-term” means the plan expects the centre to be built after 2025; some are still mostly building sites.

District	Where	Notes
Hongqiao CBD	Minhang, by Hongqiao station	Malls between the railway station and the National Exhibition and Convention Center
International Resort	Pudong, by Shanghai Disneyland	Disneytown and the outlet village
Qiantan	Pudong, south of the Expo site	New riverside district around Taikoo Li Qiantan
Wujiaochang	Yangpu, northeast	Five-way junction with malls, near Fudan and Tongji universities
North Sichuan Road	Hongkou	Hongkou’s long north–south shopping street, laid out in the 1870s
Zhongshan Park	Changning	Malls around a Line 2, 3 and 4 interchange
Hongqiao–Gubei	Changning	Malls and a large Japanese and Korean community
Daning	Jing’an, north	Malls beside Daning Lingshi Park
Middle Ring (Zhenbei)	Putuo	Large malls on the Middle Ring Road
Zhenru	Putuo	Around Shanghai West station and Zhenru Temple
Wuzhong Road	Minhang	Mall strip promoted from district level in 2022
Lingang New Area	Pudong, far southeast	New town by Dishui Lake
Suhewan (long-term)	Jing’an, Suzhou Creek	Riverside redevelopment by the Sihang Warehouse
Xuhui Riverside (long-term)	Xuhui	The West Bund, on the Huangpu
Yangpu Riverside (long-term)	Yangpu	Former industrial riverfront
Wusong (long-term)	Baoshan	Old port town at the mouth of the Huangpu
Xinzhuang (long-term)	Minhang	Around the Xinzhuang sub-centre
Pudong Airport–East Station (long-term)	Pudong	By the airport and the new railway station
Jiading, Qingpu, Songjiang, Fengxian new towns (long-term)	Outer districts	Centres for the new towns, each planned around a rail hub

Smaller shopping streets worth knowing

Not every good shopping street is a city-level centre. Tianzifang is a block of lane houses full of small shops; Xintiandi and Sinan Mansions have restaurants and boutiques in restored houses; Wukang Road and Anfu Road, in the former French Concession, have independent shops and cafés; and M50 has galleries that sell art.

Practical points

• Paying. Set up Alipay or WeChat Pay before you go shopping; see How to pay in Shanghai for what works with a foreign card.
• When to go. The central streets are at their most crowded at weekends and in the national holidays in early May and early October; go on a weekday if you can. See When to visit.
• Getting there. Every district above is on the metro. Plan the journey on our metro planner.