SharpPost Special 2026 · MAY · 13

To know, or not to know: China's information split

Pre-dawn on May 13, SharpPost's web team noticed an unusual referrer in the server logs. A visit from Beijing had arrived via the homepage of China's Cyberspace Administration reporting portal. This special edition asks why a reader would risk legal liability to jump the Great Firewall just to report a story they object to.

SharpPost Editorial Desk

A Chinese city skyline at night, with the lights of a highway threading through it
A Chinese city at night. Among 1.4 billion citizens, an estimated 150 to 350 million open a VPN every day to read what is on the other side. Photo by Chen Zy / Unsplash

Two numbers frame this story.

The first. Independent estimates put the number of Chinese VPN users between 150 and 350 million — roughly 15 to 35 percent of the country's online population. Cybernews classifies China as having one of the world's lowest VPN adoption rates, a finding the report itself acknowledges as a statistical illusion: Google Play is blocked and Apple's App Store in China is heavily restricted, so mainstream installations rely on sideloading, which falls outside conventional app-store statistics.

The second. The China Digital Times archive, hosted at the University of California, Berkeley, recorded 357 deleted Chinese-language posts in 2024 and 425 in 2025, a 19% increase. By December 2025, the cumulative count stood at 2,344 articles. CDT notes that this represents "only a small fraction of what disappears from the Chinese internet each day."

Two numbers · One fact
First · VPN users
150–350million
15 to 35 percent of Chinese internet users. Cybernews's "lowest adoption" finding is a statistical artifact — sideloaded apps escape app-store metrics.
Second · CDT 404 archive
2,344posts
As of December 2025. 425 added in 2025, +19% year-on-year. CDT itself: "only a small fraction" of daily deletions.

The two numbers describe one fact. Demand for what sits outside the firewall is large enough to sustain a multi-billion-dollar gray VPN market; the political tolerance for what remains inside it keeps narrowing. Between these two trend lines lies the daily life of several hundred million people.

For some of them, what they find outside the wall produces cognitive dissonance.

ⅠThree domains of dissonance

International affairs. US-China relations, the war in Ukraine, Iran, the Taiwan Strait — on each, the Chinese press and the international press routinely tell two different stories. People want to know what will happen with tariffs, whether their children can still study safely abroad, whether to rebalance their dollar holdings.

Economic data. Between 2024 and 2026, China's urban middle class watched property prices retreat from their peak, stock-market volatility intensify, tech and finance layoffs continue, the official youth unemployment figure hover above 16 percent (with publication suspended in some months), and consumer confidence sit at multi-year lows. People around them lose jobs; salaries flatline. The official line remains "steady, with healthy momentum."

Generational gaps. Parents watch CCTV News, read People's Daily, and listen to Guancha. Their adult children open X, YouTube, Reddit and Telegram. Two generations in one household live inside two separate information worlds.

Chinese city skyline at night, illuminated buildings against the sky
The official line is "steady, with healthy momentum." The lived experience over the past two years has not matched the official line. Photo by Li Yang / Unsplash

ⅡOne person, two narratives

Most ordinary people end up in a shared condition — two narratives held simultaneously inside one person.

On the surface. Trust the official statistics. Trust the mainstream account. Believe that the future will improve. Believe that China will win. Do not raise sensitive topics in WeChat Moments. Keep the family peaceful. Post only food and travel photos to social media.

Underneath. Know the economic slowdown is real. Know that international affairs are not improving. Know that the next few years carry personal uncertainty. Know that a number of friends have begun quietly consulting immigration agencies. Know that the children's overseas study plans need to start earlier. None of this is said in public. By day, the official vocabulary. By evening, the news from the other side of the wall. The switch is automatic.

Editor's Note · 编辑说

ⅢTwo responses

When a large number of ordinary people share the same psychological condition — wanting to know the truth while fearing it — the condition itself becomes a phenomenon. Some respond as activists, reporting any content that conflicts with the inside-the-wall narrative as a way of protecting their existing worldview. Others adapt.

For the first group. Maintaining two parallel narratives is an ongoing psychological cost. The cost is small. It does not stop. The hope is that reporting and deletion will produce out-of-sight, out-of-mind relief. The condition has no natural end. More information does not resolve it — more information sharpens the choice. Less information does not resolve it — less information sharpens the anxiety. The condition will persist until external conditions shift materially — in the economy, in international affairs, or in the information environment.

For the second group. Adaptation. Reason. Treating truth and credible information as inputs to one's own life decisions. Asset allocation, career planning, and education investments are built on that foundation.

SOURCES. China Digital Times Chinese year-end roundups (2024 / 2025); CNNIC 54th Statistical Report on China's Internet Development; Cybernews / DataGlobeHub VPN usage research; National Bureau of Statistics youth unemployment data; China Securities Depository and Clearing Corporation public data; BBC Chinese, SCMP, China Media Project reporting on China's information environment (2024-2026); Freedom House Freedom on the Net 2024 — China.