Hong Kong

The currency is the Hong Kong dollar (HKD). The exchange-rate system linked to the US dollar began in 1983; the band of HK$7.75 to HK$7.85 per US$1 was established in 2005. Check a current rate to convert other currencies and compare exchange fees. Banknotes are issued by three commercial banks (HSBC, Standard Chartered and Bank of China), so it's normal to receive three different designs of the same HK$100 note, and all three are worth the same. For food, expect coffee at HK$35–50, a cha chaan teng meal at HK$50–80, a bowl of noodles at HK$45–70 and a dim sum lunch at HK$120–200. A beer at a bar costs HK$70–110, a cocktail in Central HK$130–180 and an MTR ride HK$5–15. For a bed, a hostel dorm costs HK$200–350 and a double room in a simple hotel HK$800–1,400 a night. Accommodation carries a 3% tax, reintroduced on January 1, 2025, and hotels and sit-down restaurants add a 10% service charge. Tipping isn't required: with the service charge already on the bill, just leave the coins from your change, and round up in taxis. Cards work in shops, chains and larger restaurants, but street markets, dai pai dong, minibuses and stalls run on cash or Octopus, and there are ATMs on every block.

Twenty-four minutes on the Airport Express

From Hong Kong International Airport (Chek Lap Kok, on Lantau), the fastest route is the Airport Express: 24 minutes to Hong Kong station, in Central, and 21 to Kowloon, for HK$120 and about HK$105 on an adult ticket (fares adjusted on June 22, 2026, the first increase in eight years), with discounts for advance purchase and free shuttle buses to hotels. If you're not in a hurry, there are cheaper options: buses A11, A21 and E11 charge HK$25–50 and take 45–75 minutes, and a red taxi to Tsim Sha Tsui costs HK$270–320, plus the bridge toll and HK$6–7 per suitcase. Arriving from Macau or Zhuhai, you can use the 55 km sea bridge opened in October 2018, and high-speed trains run from West Kowloon to Guangzhou and Beijing.

The MTR handles almost everything, every two minutes

Within the city, the MTR handles almost everything: ten urban lines plus the Airport Express and the Light Rail, trains every two to five minutes, from around 6am to around 1am, with fares from HK$5 to HK$15 on most urban trips. The Octopus card is the standard means of payment, and here the key and the cash are the same object: it costs HK$150 for the adult version (HK$50 refundable deposit plus HK$100 in real credit) or the tourist version from HK$39, with no deposit and no refund, and it pays for tram, ferry, bus, convenience stores, and vending machines. Since 2022, MTR turnstiles accept contactless credit cards and QR codes, but buses, trams, and minibuses don't give change in cash. The tram charges a flat fare of about HK$3 when you get off, the Star Ferry HK$5–6.5, and the green and red 19-seat minibuses require you to shout “yáuh lohk” to get off, because there's no stop button. Taxis are split by area (red in the city, green in the New Territories, blue on Lantau) with a flag fall around HK$29; ride apps exist, but platform regulation was only approved in 2025 and is phasing in. On foot, Central, Wan Chai, and Kowloon have networks of covered footbridges that let you walk for kilometers without crossing a street; a bicycle only makes sense in the New Territories, on the cycle path between Sha Tin and Tai Po.

Hong Kong has one of the lowest violent crime rates among the world's big cities, and walking alone at night is normal almost everywhere, including on the subway up to the last train. The real risks are small and predictable, and nearly all depend on time and place. Pickpockets work where there are crowds: Temple Street, Mong Kok, Causeway Bay and packed ferries. Tailors, money changers and electronics shops in Tsim Sha Tsui tout on Nathan Road and switch the agreed model at the moment of payment. Check the price, model and receipt before you pay, buy electronics from a recognized chain and be wary of anything without a price tag. There are also taxis that refuse to use the meter for tunnel crossings, and offers of “jade tea” or gemstones at inflated prices. The biggest danger here is the weather: typhoons between May and November and the amber, red and black rainstorm warnings, which cause flooding and landslides. Follow the Hong Kong Observatory and don't go out under Signal No. 8 or a black warning. On the trails, the problem is heat and dehydration: carry water, tell someone your plans and note the number of the nearest marker post in case of emergency (112 and 999 both work). Finally, since 2020 there have been clear legal limits on political expression: demonstrations, banners and protest materials can lead to serious trouble, and it's wise neither to take part in nor to record that kind of situation.

Tap two fingers on the table when someone pours your tea

The gesture (two knuckles tapping the table twice) is a silent thank-you that avoids interrupting the conversation. To ask for a refill, leave the teapot lid open or off to the side.

Stand on the right on escalators

People standing still keep to the right; the left is for walking. It holds at every station and is the most enforced rule of movement in the city, along with letting people off before boarding a train car.

Don't eat or drink inside the MTR

Eating and drinking are banned throughout the MTR's paid area, from the turnstiles in, with fines of up to HK$5,000. Nobody eats on the train or even drinks water, and staff will approach tourists holding a coffee.

Give and receive with both hands

Business cards, cash, gifts, and menus are passed with both hands and a slight nod. Given a business card, look at it before putting it away; don't write on it in front of the person who gave it.

At a shared table, serve the other person's plate first

Dishes come to the center and are served with serving chopsticks or by flipping your own; fill the eldest person's cup first. Never stick chopsticks upright in rice, a gesture associated with funeral offerings.

Be careful with politics in public

Since the 2020 National Security Law and the 2024 Article 23 legislation, slogans, posters and protest materials can have legal consequences. Don't photograph police operations and avoid discussing politics with strangers.

Most of the territory lies off the island

Thinking Hong Kong is a single island and getting stuck between Central and Tsim Sha Tsui. Seven-eighths of the territory sits on the other side of the harbor and in the New Territories, and 40% of the area is country park with trails 40 minutes away by subway.

Assuming Mandarin or English will cover it

Speaking Mandarin or English on the assumption that it covers everything. Cantonese is the language of the street for about 88% of the population; English works in hotels, the MTR, and larger restaurants, but at stalls and on minibuses an “m̀h-gōi” points the way faster than a full sentence.

Boarding the bus or tram with a large bill

Boarding the bus, tram, or minibus with a bill in hand. None of them give change in cash, and on the tram, which costs about HK$3, the difference stays with the company: top up your Octopus before leaving the hotel, or carry coins separately.

Street at 33°C, subway at 21°C: the temperature shock

Going without a light jacket in summer, which sounds absurd until it happens to you. The street sits at 33 °C and 85% humidity, the subway and malls sit at 21 °C, and the thermal shock between the two is what wears visitors down.

Typhoon Signal No. 8 means the city is closed

Ignoring the Observatory's signals. Typhoon Signal No. 8 or a black rainstorm warning means the city is closed, and insisting on going out with those warnings up usually ends with no taxi to be found and a canceled tour with no refund.

唔該 (m̀h-gōi)

“thank you / excuse me”: used to ask for room to pass, call the waiter, and thank someone for a small favor; the single most useful word in the city

多謝 (dō-jeh)

“thank you very much”: used when receiving a gift, a meal someone else paid for, or a discount, not for everyday favors

你好 (néih-hóu)

“hello”

埋單 (màaih-dāan)

“check, please”: usually accompanied by the gesture of writing in the air

幾多錢？ (géi-dō chín)

“how much does it cost?”

有落 (yáuh lohk)

“getting off here”: shout it on the green or red minibus, because it has no stop button

Central and Sheung Wan

The financial district and the oldest colonial core, with banks, courts, and the Mid-Levels escalator climbing up to SoHo. Sheung Wan, next door, holds the dried-seafood and herbal-medicine shops of Des Voeux Road West, galleries on Hollywood Road, and cafés around Tai Ping Shan.

Wan Chai and Causeway Bay

Wan Chai combines office towers, the street market on Tai Yuen Street, and old tenement rows like the 1922 Blue House. Causeway Bay is mass-market shopping: Times Square, Japanese stores, the 19-hectare Victoria Park, and the cannon fired every day at noon by Jardine Matheson since the 19th century.

Tsim Sha Tsui

The southern tip of Kowloon, with the Avenue of Stars promenade, public museums, historic hotels like the Peninsula (1928), and the multicultural maze of Chungking Mansions. It's the best side for photographing the island's skyline, and where the electronics shops and tailors that approach tourists on Nathan Road are found.

Mong Kok and Yau Ma Tei

One of the densest urban stretches in the world, with themed markets street by street: flowers on Flower Market Road, birds at Yuen Po, sneakers on Fa Yuen Street, electronics and vinyl secondhand shops in vertical buildings. At night, Yau Ma Tei's Temple Street fills with food stalls, fortune-tellers, and street Cantonese opera.

Sham Shui Po

A low-income district and the most interesting one for seeing the city actually at work: used electronics on Apliu Street, fabrics and notions on Ki Lung Street, workshops and new studios in converted industrial buildings. It also has some of the best cheap restaurants in the city, and Mei Ho House, a 1954 public-housing block turned museum and hostel.

Kennedy Town and Sai Ying Pun

The far west of the island, connected to the MTR only since 2014 and 2015, which brought cafés and bars to a neighborhood of markets and temples. The Kennedy Town waterfront and the sunset over the container port are the local late-afternoon ritual.

Kowloon City and Kai Tak

On the site of the old airport, a planned district has grown up around Kai Tak Sports Park, opened March 1, 2025. Kowloon City, next door, is the city's Little Thailand, with grocery stores and Thai restaurants established since the 1980s, and Kowloon Walled City Park stands where the old walled city was demolished in 1993–94.

Sai Kung and the outlying islands

Sai Kung is the eastern coast of the New Territories, with a fishing village, seafood restaurants, and access to the UNESCO Global Geopark. Lantau, Cheung Chau, and Lamma are islands with few or no cars, beaches, trails, and low-rise villages, all less than an hour by ferry or metro from downtown.

The hill and Hong Kong's scarce flat ground

Hong Kong occupies 1,114 km² of land on the eastern edge of the Pearl River Delta, and most of it is hill: Tai Mo Shan reaches 957 m in the New Territories and Victoria Peak 552 m on the island, which left little flat ground for 7.5 million people. The historical answer was to reclaim land and build up.

Reclaim and build up: podium and tower

Central's shoreline has advanced hundreds of meters into the sea since the first land reclamation in 1852, and Chek Lap Kok Airport, opened in 1998, was built on an island expanded by reclamation off Lantau's north coast, which gained a third runway in November 2024. The result is a podium-and-tower urbanism: a four-story commercial base, a deck, and residential blocks of 30 to 60 floors above, linked by covered footbridges that let you cross all of Central without ever stepping onto the street.

Territory: 40% parkland, subtropical monsoon climate

While the city grew upward, the 1976 Country Parks Ordinance protected the hills: 24 country parks and special areas cover about 40% of the territory, with trails such as the MacLehose (100 km) starting 40 minutes by subway from the financial district. The climate is monsoonal subtropical, with a hot, humid summer from May to September, a typhoon season from May to November peaking between July and September, and a short, dry, gray winter from December to February.

Film: from Bruce Lee to Wong Kar-wai

Film is the most recognizable cultural export: the Shaw Brothers and Golden Harvest studios produced Bruce Lee's kung fu, Jackie Chan's physical comedy, John Woo's gunfight ballet, and later the auteur cinema of Wong Kar-wai, whose “In the Mood for Love” (2000) rebuilt the Hong Kong of the 1962 Shanghai refugees. “Infernal Affairs” (2002) became the basis for Scorsese's “The Departed.” The Hong Kong International Film Festival has run since 1977, usually between March and April.

Cantopop shaped the region's taste

In music, Cantopop shaped the taste of all of East Asia between the 1980s and 1990s, with Leslie Cheung, Anita Mui, Danny Chan, and the band Beyond; the boy band Mirror put the genre back in the conversation starting in 2018. Cantonese opera is still alive in temples, parks, and at the Xiqu Centre, which opened in West Kowloon in January 2019. The city is also an art hub: Art Basel Hong Kong has run since 2013, in March, and sustains a gallery circuit in the Pedder Building and in Wong Chuk Hang.

Horse racing since 1846 and the rugby Sevens

Sport organizes the calendar: Happy Valley has held horse races since 1846, and the Wednesday night meets, with a token general-admission fee, began in 1973, when the track got floodlights; the Hong Kong Sevens rugby tournament moved in 2025 to the new Kai Tak stadium. Day to day, communal life plays out on shared ground: tai chi in the parks at dawn, noisy mahjong in neighborhood halls, Sundays when Filipino and Indonesian domestic workers, more than 350,000 in total, take over Central's footbridges and plazas with mats, food, and speakers. Hand-tied bamboo is still used as scaffolding on construction sites, a practice the government began replacing with metal on public works starting in 2025.

“Hong Kong”, by Jan Morris (1988, revised 1997)

The fullest portrait of the colonial city written before the handover, blending history, geography, and street observation: useful precisely because it describes the world that today's Hong Kong replaced.

“In the Mood for Love”, by Wong Kar-wai (2000)

Rebuilds the Hong Kong of 1962, when Shanghainese families shared cramped flats in Kowloon, and shows visually what it means to live in a city with no private space.

“Infernal Affairs”, by Andrew Lau and Alan Mak (2002)

A triad thriller shot on rooftops, in office towers, and on the streets of Central; it became the basis for Scorsese's “The Departed,” and shows the vertical city as a field of surveillance.