Beijing Bus Tours: Routes, Fares and Scam Alerts
Board the wrong queue and you lose the whole day
At both Beitucheng and Deshengmen, uniformed touts wait for the exact moment a foreign visitor looks lost and tell them Bus 877 is cancelled. It is not. The trick redirects riders into an overpriced private van that stops at a jade or silk factory before it ever reaches the Great Wall. Walk past anyone in a costume-like uniform and board only the marked municipal green bus. That single habit is the difference between a normal day trip and a wasted one.
Bus 877 to Badaling
The official coach to Badaling Great Wall still costs about 12 CNY in cash, or 6 CNY with a transit card, and takes roughly 60 to 75 minutes. Its main departure point has moved: Beitucheng Metro Station, on the northeast corner of the Beitucheng intersection near Exit B/C where Lines 8 and 10 meet, is now the primary boarding point. Deshengmen still runs a reduced schedule but is no longer the main stop. If you would rather skip the swap-the-terminus confusion entirely, a Badaling round-trip train ticket on the bullet line from Beijing North or Qinghe reaches Badaling’s underground station in 20 to 30 minutes, no bus stop navigation required.
Sightseeing Lines 1 and 2
Beijing’s municipal transport group runs two open-top double-decker sightseeing routes. Line 1 runs east to west along Chang’an Avenue, passing Tiananmen and the National Museum at elevated viewing height. Line 2 traces the old Central Axis between Qianmen and the Drum Tower, the same 7.8-kilometer corridor UNESCO recognized in 2024. Both routes are cheap, run on fixed timetables, and need no advance booking, which makes them a good low-effort way to get oriented on day one before tackling the sites that do require reservations.
Chartered coaches to Mutianyu
Because Mutianyu sits further out and has better tourist infrastructure, private double-decker operators run scheduled daily departures from Dongzhimen and Qianmen with guaranteed seating and on-board ticketing help, useful if the idea of finding the right municipal queue does not appeal. A Mutianyu cable car and toboggan day tour folds the coach seat, the lift up and the toboggan down into one booking.
Paying on board
Beijing’s buses run on tap-to-pay QR codes through Alipay or WeChat Pay. Both apps now let foreign Visa, Mastercard or similar cards bind directly through in-app passport verification and facial recognition, no Chinese bank account or local SIM required, which removes the old headache of needing exact change or a physical transit card before you board. Keep a little cash anyway; small kiosks near bus stops do not always have change for a card tap gone wrong.
The verdict
For a first orientation lap, the sightseeing double-decker beats a walking tour on a hot day and costs a fraction of a private car. For the Great Wall specifically, the bullet train to Badaling is the more reliable choice for a tight schedule, since it sidesteps the terminus confusion and the tout problem outright; save Bus 877 for travelers who enjoy the more analog, slower version of the same trip. Full details on the Central Axis bus and subway routes and general subway and bus network are on the municipal government’s English travel pages.
If you only take one tip from this page: whichever stop you board from, walk past the first person who greets you in English before you have found the actual queue. For a fuller Great Wall plan beyond the bus ride itself, the Great Wall day trip options lay out which section suits which traveler.