Hard to Get a Ticket Home for the New Year, Yet Trains Run with Empty Seats — CCP Ticketing Platform Accused of Manipulation

From Guangzhou to Lhasa, China's longest train route, spanning 53 hours in total. (Screenshot from video)

[People News] During the New Year travel rush, train tickets across many regions in China have been extremely difficult to obtain. Numerous passengers report that on the official railway ticketing platform 12306, tickets for many popular routes show as “sold out” the moment they go on sale, while waiting lists continue to grow. Yet when passengers finally board, they find trains running with a surprisingly high number of empty seats. Related videos and complaints have spread widely across social media.

According to Radio Free Asia, the China State Railway Group stated that during the 2026 travel rush, railways nationwide are expected to transport approximately 540 million passenger trips, an increase of about 5 percent year-on-year. As of 8 a.m. on February 7, the 12306 platform had reportedly sold about 140 million tickets. Railway authorities said that on February 6, 12.845 million passengers were transported nationwide, and on February 7 an estimated 13.8 million passengers would travel. Authorities also planned to add 1,249 additional passenger trains, claiming that operations were “stable and orderly.”

However, travelers from Guangdong, Fujian, Sichuan and other regions told reporters that they had spent consecutive days trying to secure tickets on the 12306 platform. Regular train and some high-speed rail tickets were snapped up instantly upon release, forcing passengers to choose transfer routes or purchase full-route tickets covering additional stops.

Passengers Struggle for Tickets, Yet Carriages Show Empty Seats

Liu Yanling, an employee at a foreign trade company in Shenzhen, told Radio Free Asia that after repeatedly failing to secure a ticket, she plans to drive back to Hebei this week with friends, taking turns at the wheel. “I originally wanted to buy a high-speed rail ticket, but I just couldn’t get one. I haven’t been able to buy a travel-rush ticket for two consecutive years,” she said.

What confuses many passengers even more is that after finally securing a seat—sometimes through last-minute refunds—they discover that the train is far from full. A passenger traveling from Qingdao to Wuhan said that after failing to purchase tickets for multiple dates, he eventually boarded through a refund channel and found many empty seats in his carriage. Videos show noticeable vacancies in certain sections of the train. One netizen remarked: “They say tickets are impossible to get, but once you’re on the train, there’s hardly anyone in the carriage. Where did all the tickets go?”

Official Ticketing Mechanism Under Question

Recently, 12306 has frequently trended online due to ticketing controversies. Netizens on Weibo, WeChat, and Douyin posted videos showing that they completed all purchase preparations before tickets went on sale, yet at the exact release time, the page refreshed and instantly displayed “sold out.” Similar situations reportedly occurred repeatedly across different routes and times. One user commented bluntly: “At this speed, it’s impossible for ordinary people to get tickets.”

Online discussions also suggest that tickets may be flowing to third-party platforms, causing official sales to show “sold out” within minutes. In response, 12306 has stated that it has never opened ticketing interfaces to any third party and that all tickets are sold exclusively through the official system.

Huang Kun, a resident of Wuxi, told Radio Free Asia that he is unclear about how third-party platforms appear more successful in securing tickets. “These third-party platforms charge service fees, so naturally the price is higher. In the past, individual scalpers resold tickets. Now it looks more like transactions between companies. Ordinary people have no way to supervise this.”

Ticket Supply “Derails” Toward Third Parties

Huang said such situations inevitably raise public suspicion, even if direct evidence is hard to find. “If you can’t get tickets on the official platform, but third parties can, people will naturally suspect someone is profiting in between.”

Many netizens argue that if the official platform consistently shows no tickets available while trains run with empty seats, then ticket sales results may not match actual transport capacity. The tickets may be “sold out,” but the seats are not actually filled.

Lin Ting, a resident of Fujian, told reporters that 12306 trending online due to ticketing problems is ironic. “In the past, scalpers resold tickets and police would arrest them. Later it was revealed that some station insiders released tickets to scalpers in advance for high-priced resale. Now with real-name registration, it’s harder for individuals to cheat, so it seems to have become collusion between official institutions and ticketing platforms. It’s just a different way of making money, and in the end, ordinary people suffer.”

Scalpers Change Disguises

He lamented: “Times change, the method of cheating changes, but the套路 (tactic) doesn’t change. Scalpers have just changed their disguises. The unlucky ones are always ordinary passengers.”

The New Year travel rush is China’s largest annual migration period, centered around the Lunar New Year and lasting about 40 days. It includes massive flows of people returning home to visit family, migrant workers traveling back to jobs, and students in transit. The 2026 travel rush began on February 2 and will end on March 13. Officials predict that during this period, cross-regional mobility across rail, road, and air will remain at a high level, with railways continuing to serve as one of the primary long-distance travel methods.

As of now, railway authorities have not provided further clarification regarding issues such as “trains running with empty seats,” “buying tickets for extra stops to secure a seat,” or “higher success rates through third-party platforms.”

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