15 Popular Chinese Karaoke Songs 2024 (not banned in China)

Karaoke is one of the most common social activities in China. It’s a quite interesting form of partying, developing friendships, impressing people. If you’re a foreigner that intend to experience the Chinese karaoke, the very first advise for you is to pick a Chinese karaoke song and impress your local friends.

Here 15 popular Chinese Karaoke songs for you, including songs that’ll make your Chinese friends so exciting!

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1. Wolf Disco《野狼disco》

Performed by gem (宝石 gem)

As we know, rap music becomes phenomenal in China because of the TV show “Rap of China”. This song “Wolf Disco” is the one from the Rap of China Season 3, being another explosive one. What’s funny is that there are not many people able to sing it quite perfectly but people still love to play it in karaoke because they can dance to it. You want to learn the dance? Check this link:  

2. Little Apple 《小苹果》

Performed by Chopsticks Brothers (筷子兄弟)

It is a work released by Chopsticks Brothers, a Chinese music group, on May 29, 2014. It is a promotional song for the movie “the old boy’s Dragon Crossing the River” starring the Chopsticks brothers and Qu Jingjing, then becoming popular because of a network adaptation.

The original intention of “little apple” is to pay homage to the retro disco. The music is light and the melody is easy to remember.

3. Embrace 《拥抱》

Performed by Mayday (五月天)

In 1997, homosexuality attracted attention and aroused great repercussions in the music industry. The expression of homosexuality, through gentle touch, is to slowly say another love view beyond heterosexuality, so that these voices at the bottom of the souls of long-neglected comrades have a sky to play wild. And Mayday’s song “Embrace” is no longer a secret sob, but a happy and comfortable being yourselves.

4. Last Dance 《Last Dance》

Performed by Wu Bai (伍佰)

Produced by famous Taiwan singer Wu Bai, Last Dance focuses on describing lovers’ reluctance to part when they leave, by making it seems that they are unwilling to do their best to get hold of their lovers. The last dance is full of longing for love and being loved. Although it is heartbreaking sadness, it doesn’t see through the negative disappointment of love and no longer nostalgia for love. With the deep and vicissitudes of singing, the lyric full of poetic feelings and saturated with the sense of the picture, Wu Bai interprets the remaining feelings of lovers when they are separated to the extreme.

5. Waiting For You 《等你下课》

Performed by Jay Chou (周杰伦)

This song comes from a story that Jay Chou came up with, which is about a young man secretly falling in love with a girl and being regretted that he didn’t study hard and didn’t go to the same university as the girl. In order to wait for her to finish class, he rented a house near the girl’s residence and waited for her silently. The young man kept playing the piano and writing love letters. He just wanted to convey his heart to her, but he couldn’t find the time and way. This song Won Billboard Radio China 2018 Chinese Golden Melody

6. Won’t Cry《说好不哭》

Performed by Jay Chou (周杰伦) Mayday (五月天)

Jay Chou once acted as a performing guest at Mayday Concert in 2018 and he thinks that it would be great if they could have a chance to cooperate with a song. Jay Chou invited Mayday’s main singer, Xin, to sing the song. During the process of creating the song, Jay Chou has ideas and arranges well on the chorus and other details, so it’s a very relaxing process. They finished the song without spending too much time and the song is exploding in 2019, winning the top ten Golden Melody Awards of Miguhui in the 13th Music Festival.

7. Mr. Almost 《差不多先生》

Performed by MC HotDog (热狗)

The grantly, rap song was never a popular choice in Chinese Karaoke. Not only because it’s so hard to sing but also because there are so few good rap songs in China before. The rap song Mr. Almost is an exception one, produced by the one and only MC HotDog, Taipei’s self-proclaimed “preacher of hip hop.”

8. Boundless Ocean Vast Skies 《海阔天空》

Performed by Beyond

A classic Chinese rock song released in 1993 by Beyond, one of the most famous Cantopop/Cantonese rock bands of all time. It’s been a hugely popular song for decades. The lyrics are in Cantonese but everybody, even those northerners that can’t understand a word of Cantonese, can still sing along with the lyrics.

9. Miss You 3000《想见你想见你想见你》

Performed by 381 (三八夭)

There is a Taiwan TV series being extremely popular in China, called “Miss You” and the song “Miss You 3000” is the theme song of it. Even though the series is ending for a while, Chinese people are still having a strong attachment to it and play “Miss You 3000” very often when they’re in karaoke.

10. Rewind《倒带》

Performed by Jolin Tsai (蔡依林)

Lots of Chinese people love the Taiwanese singer Jolin Tsai. Not only because her songs are quality and classic, but also because she is one of the Taiwan artists that bring Taiwan-style pop music to the most younger generations of China, impacting tons of Chinese people. Her representative song “Rewind” is a style of “British rock”, making people feel very refreshed. In 2006, at the Hong Kong Concert, when she sang the line “The past is sweet rewind, but the feeling is no longer there”, she burst into tears. This song is full of Jolin Tsai’s feelings

11. Princess《王妃》

Performed by Jam Hsiao (萧敬腾)

Princess is Taiwanese Mandopop artist Jam Hsiao’s second Mandarin studio album. It was released on 17 July 2009 by Warner Music Taiwan The album was available for pre-order, from 23 June 2009, as the Princess (First Press Limited Edition) which includes gifts and photobooks. Because of this song’s high singing skill requirement, lots of Chinese people love to play it in karaoke, considering it a challenge.

12. Bubble《泡沫》

Performed by GEM (邓紫棋)

Another difficult Chinese song by GEM, one of the most popular female singers in China. The song “Bubble” requires you a very high pitch so in most of time, people love to take this song as a challenge. If you can perfectly perform it, you will the star at that night without a doubt.  

13. Planet Crashing《星球坠落》

Performed by AIR (艾热) JelloRio (李佳隆)

An original rap song coming from the famous TV show “Rap of China”, “Planet Crashing” was the most heat song at the time. People were crazy loving it. In fact, “Planet Crashing” is a love song, but with some hip-hop-style chorus and cool lyrics, it’s quite refreshing and catchy. Nowadays, it’s still one of the most popular rap songs in the Chinese karaoke playlist.

14. Decade 《十年》

Performed by Eason Chan (陈奕迅)

Eason Chan is a fantastic singer from Hong Kong. This song “Decade” actually is the Chinese version of a Cantonese song called “Next Year’s Today”, both performed by Eason Chan. At the time, “Next Year’s Today” was a big heat and because Eason’s agent want him to enter the mainland China market, Eason was required to perform a Chinese version of “Next Year’s Today”, which is the song we’re talking about, “Decade”. This song was surprisingly becoming a huge heat, making Eason a phenomenal singer in China.

If you’re going to Chinese karaoke, this is the one you can’t miss!

15. Thousand Sad Reasons《一千个伤心的理由》

Performed by Jacky Cheung (张学友)

“Thousand Sad Reasons” sung by Jacky Cheung has a beautiful opening melody. The melody of the entire song is combined with the singer’s voice to form a beautiful universal melody portraying such a classic song. The amazing sales of the album, “True Love New Songs Collection”, cannot be separated from the success of this song. It is also one of the important Mandarin songs by Jacky Cheung to establish himself as the king of Mandarin music. It is a classic masterpiece and a classic song in Chinese pop music.

15 Fun Facts About Chinese Karaoke

Karaoke in China is one of the most prevailing entertainment activities. You might think the Chinese are quite stern and rigid in their daily life, but mostly because they’re just shy to express their emotion in public.

Privately, the Chinese can also be as so much fun as those Western people, and karaoke is a good way to prove it.

Can’t wait to go experience karaoke in China? Before you go, here are 15 tips you should know about the Chinese karaoke culture.

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1. Karaoke bar in China is not open 24 hours

I’ve been noticing that many people thought karaoke bars in China are open 24 hours. But it’s simply not true. In fact, the business hour of most karaoke bars in China is around 12:00 pm to 3:00 am, which is stipulated by law.

People sometimes might be confusing the karaoke bar with the club because some Chinese clubs are also offering karaoke service and are open 24 hours.

However, they are two totally distinctive things. So if you’re looking for karaoke bars in China, I recommend you to use keywords like “KTV”, “karaoke bar”, and “karaoke box” for searching.

2. Karaoke is paid by the hour

If you want to go for singing in the karaoke bar, you should at least pay for the one-hour fee. The Karaoke bars in China are charging by the hour and there is no limit time. You can just pay for one hour of singing time, or for all day long, which is completely fine.

Also, karaoke bars will provide various discounted packages for you to choose from so they can induce you to pay for more hours.

One important thing you need to know is that the price is greatly cheap during the working days (from Monday to Thursday) and it’s going to be double during the weekend (from Friday to Sunday).  

3. If you want to karaoke on Friday and Saturday nights, please do the reservation

Finally, it is on Friday. You may want to find some entertainment for relaxing, so you decide to go for a few hours singing in a karaoke bar. Unfortunately, that’s not gonna happen because when you get to the karaoke bar you will find that all the karaoke rooms are booked.

Going to karaoke bars is one of the most common ways for the Chinese to relax after a week hard-working, having some drinks with friends, and singing some songs, so the karaoke bars normally will be full of people during the weekend

My sincere suggestion for you is that be smart and go make a reservation in advance during the daytime on Friday and then you can directly go there after work and have a really good nighttime.

4. You can find delicious foods in the karaoke bars

Karaoke bars in China are not just providing karaoke service but also various foods. I’m not talking about some lame mediocre snacks but the real delicious foods.

For example, there is a well-known karaoke bar from Taiwan called Chun-K. Chinese people are not just going there for karaoke but also for Taiwan cuisine.

Chun-K is offering consumers high-quality and typical Taiwan foods like beef noodles, Taiwan milk tea, Taiwan braised pork rice, and so on. Meanwhile, the karaoke environment of Chun-K is excellent as well, which really is a place of one stone and two birds.

There are so many karaoke bars in China using the same business model as Chun-K. Some are even providing the buffet, which you just need to pay for certain singing hours then you can enjoy all the food there. 

5. You can’t bring any drink or food to the karaoke bars

I remember once there were karaoke bars allowing consumers to bring their own drinks and foods by charging consumers a certain amount of fees.

It was a bargain because it would save you quite a lot of money if you bought stuff from the outside like a supermarket.

I guess the time has changed. Nowadays karaoke bars in China are strictly forbidding people to bring any drink or food.

For one thing, they want you to pay for the food and drinks in the karaoke bars which are way more expensive. For another, they want to prevent people to mess up the karaoke rooms, lowering the maintenance costs.

6. Karaoke is not just for singing but drinking

If your Chinese friends invite you to go to the karaoke bar, don’t think it’s just about singing songs. Chinese people don’t consider karaoke bars solely a place for singing but for having happy hours.

The thing normally is going to be like this: they will order alcoholic drinks in advance, singing songs while drinking.

Gradually, when they’ve got enough alcohol and felt high, karaoke stuff will be totally forgotten and the drinking game will be started. They love playing a drinking game with dice called “Liars dice” and drinking glass by glass until one of them gives up.

There are lots of fun when you’re drinking with Chinese. They are enthusiastic, they are humorous, and they are friendly.

7. Chinese love to launch parties in karaoke bars

The karaoke bar is a super versatile place. Chinese people love to host various events in the karaoke bar such as birthday parties, surprise parties, farewell parties, classmates gatherings, and so on.

In fact, it is a perfect place for launching those kinds of things. Not only because of its excellent environment but also because of its convenience feature.

A karaoke bar is simply an all-in-one place, which means you are able to ask for decorating rooms for different themes, order nice foods and snacks, play games there, sing songs, drink various beers and cocktails, chat with your friends, etc.

8. The foreign language songs are limited

You might disappoint with the list of songs because there are not many foreign language songs to pick in Chinese karaoke. Even the catalog of English songs is not very rich, not to mention other minority languages.

But there is one thing I’m sure that many classic English pop songs still can be found, such as Michael Jackson’s songs, The Beetle’s songs, Britney Spears’ songs, etc., and songs of those modern Western pop stars who are extremely hot in China are also included in the karaoke system, like Taylor Swift, Bruno Mars, Lady Gaga, etc.

9. Use your smartphone to order songs

China is all about Internet technology nowadays. Even if you’re in the karaoke room, you will feel the technology sense.

In the past, to order a song in the karaoke room, you had to go to the machine and used the lame touch screen, and every time you wanted to order a song, you had to get your ass moved. Sounds exhausted, right?

But now, you can just sit on the sofa and simply use your smartphone to scan the QR code on the screen, which will automatically connect to the karaoke system with your phone and create a mini-program in your WeChat, and then you can directly order songs through the mini-program of your smartphone.

You can also control all other functions through your phone like the sound volume, the playlist, the song’s speed, etc.

10. Now the Karaoke machine can measure your singing performance

When you’re singing, there will be a metrical pattern chart showing on the screen, which is measuring if your singing pitch is precise and your tone is on the track, and then there will be a score for your performance. Like playing little musical games which is fun but sometimes annoying.

Of course, if your tone is entirely matching with the pattern chat you’re certainly having better performance. But if you’re too focused on those little digits, you’re probably going to lose much fun. 

But why be so serious? If you like this function, open it; if you don’t like it, close it; just that simple.

11. Nobody cares how badly you sing

There is no need to be shy or ashamed. Singing at KTV is not for competition but for fun. People don’t care about how bad you sound. Instead, they will encourage you to sing more because they want you to have fun together.

Sometimes singing in KTV is more about expressing your emotions. When people are under pressure, they will just go order a very high pitched song to scream, unleashing their negative emotions; and when people are disappointed in love, they will choose those love songs for relieving themselves.

No matter what, singing good or bad is not a problem, people will appreciate it when you’re being yourselves on the KTV.

12. Chinese don’t tip in Karaoke

The services in karaoke bars are great. The waiters are polite and helpful. I think you might already know that the Chinese don’t tip waiters for the services, so you don’t have to tip in karaoke bars as well.

But don’t think that the staff working there are going to earn a meager salary, because there is a certain amount of bonus for them every time consumers buy a certain amount of alcohol.

One of my friends who has been a part-time waiter in karaoke told me that if he’s lucky, he can earn almost a thousand CNY in one night which is a lot of money in China.

So next time, if you really want to tip a little money to the waiter because of his/her excellent service, then do it which is a great thing. But you don’t need to really bother with this kind of thing in China, it’s just cultural stuff I guess.

13. There is a button for calling the service

There is a service calling button in every karaoke room for customers so they don’t need to go outside every time they want to order anything or need any help.

The button normally is set on the wall and you just need to gently press it once, Staff in karaoke bars will notice and come to your room within 2mins.

But don’t press the button for fun, or there will be a penalty.

14. Drinks reservation service

To induce consumers to buy more drinks, karaoke bars are providing drink reservation services.

When you can’t finish all the drinks you’ve bought, just call the waiter and ask for reserving those drinks, and then the waiter will document it and give you a card for acquiring back those drinks next time. There is a due date, which normally is lasting one to two months.

Because of that, when people are ordering drinks, they don’t need to worry about buying too much and will be less rational.

And even if they’ve reserved the spare drinks, they have to come back to the karaoke bar within one month or it will be a waste. A smart strategy!

15. Useful terms  help you mingle with Chinese

KTV: referring to Karaoke Television, which is the most common word for the Chinese to call the karaoke place. Nowadays Chinese don’t use the word “karaoke”, except for those older generations, they just say “Let’s go to KTV”.

唱K (chang K): as I just said Chinese don’t use karaoke anymore but KTV, so sometimes they will just use a shorter word if they want to go to KTV for singing, which is 唱K. 唱in Chinese means “sing” and “K” stands for KTV.

麦霸(mai ba): referring to those people who are singing songs one after one after one and refuse to give up the microphone. 麦 in Chinese means microphone and 霸 stands for a person who is overbearing.

劈酒(pi jiu): referring to drinking alcohol intensively. When people get high, they will have drinking games with other ones and the losers are going to drink high-volume alcohol. Therefore, when your local friends ask you to 劈酒, you probably want to refuse them.