How many days do you need in Shanghai?
Four days. That is the length of the itinerary we built for Shanghai.
Here is what each day holds. Every stop below carries its time, and every gap says how to get to the next stop, with the walk or drive time wherever both stops are mapped.
Shanghai · 4 days China
Best time: March to May and September to November.
The Bund and the old townDay 1
📍7:30 AMThe Bund
The riverside promenade lined with 1920s banking and trading houses, best in the first hour of light before the crowds arrive.
🚶 ~24 min · 🚗 ~3 min · 0.9 mi
🌳11:00 AMYu Garden and the old town bazaar
A sixteenth-century scholar’s garden of rockeries and ponds, surrounded by a dense, heavily commercial bazaar.
🚶 ~30 min · 🚗 ~4 min · 1.1 mi
📍6:00 PMNanjing Road
The pedestrianised shopping street running west from the Bund, at its most theatrical after dark.
PudongDay 2
🏰9:30 AMShanghai Tower
The tallest building in the city, with an observation deck near the top and one of the world’s fastest lifts getting you there.
🚶 ~48 min · 🚗 ~6 min · 1.8 mi
🖼️1:00 PMShanghai Museum
Back across the river, a strong collection of bronzes, ceramics and calligraphy, free to enter and rarely rushed.
🚶 ~44 min · 🚗 ~6 min · 1.6 mi
⛴️6:30 PMRiverside walk in Lujiazui
The Pudong bank at dusk, looking back at the Bund with the towers lit behind you.
The French ConcessionDay 3
🌆10:00 AMFormer French Concession streets
Plane-tree avenues of 1920s villas and lane houses; the walking itself is the attraction here.
🚶 ~21 min · 🚗 ~3 min · 0.8 mi
📍1:30 PMTianzifang
A block of shikumen lane houses turned into a warren of small studios, galleries and cafes.
🚶 ~25 min · 🚗 ~3 min · 0.9 mi
📍6:00 PMXintiandi
Restored stone-gate houses rebuilt as a dining and bar quarter, polished but a fair introduction to the architecture.
A canal townDay 4
📍9:00 AMZhujiajiao water town
A canal town on the city’s western edge, reachable by metro and bus, with stone bridges and a Ming-era street plan.
🚶 ~5 min · 🚗 ~1 min · 0.2 mi
📍1:00 PMFangsheng Bridge
The five-arch stone bridge at the centre of the town, the best vantage on the canal traffic.
🚗 ~85 min · 24 mi
⛩️5:30 PMReturn and Jing’an Temple
Back in the city, the gilded temple sits incongruously among office towers and is floodlit at night.
This is how Petrel lays out a trip. Upload your own confirmations and it builds this for your dates: flights and hotels included, with live flight status and the travel time between stops.
This is one of 126 free itineraries. Open it, change anything you want, and it becomes your trip.