Counties of China

County

Xiàn
CategoryThird level administrative division of a unitary state
LocationPeople's Republic of China
Found inPrefectures, Provinces
Number1,319 (1,307 controlled, 11 claimed) (as of 2023)
Government
Subdivisions
County
Chinese name
Simplified Chinese
Traditional Chinese
Transcriptions
Standard Mandarin
Hanyu PinyinXiàn
Tibetan name
Tibetanརྫོང་།
(formerly 宗 in Chinese)
Transcriptions
Wylierdzong
Tibetan PinyinZong
Zhuang name
ZhuangYen
Korean name
Hangul
Transcriptions
Revised Romanizationhyeon
McCune–Reischauerhyŏn
Mongolian name
Mongolian CyrillicШянь
Mongolian scriptᠰᠢᠶᠠᠨ
Transcriptions
SASM/GNCsiyan
Uyghur name
Uyghurناھىيە
Transcriptions
Latin YëziqiNahiye
Yengi YeziⱪNah̡iyə
SASM/GNCNaĥiyə
Manchu name
Manchu scriptᡥᡳᠶᠠᠨ
Möllendorffhiyan
Kazakh name
Kazakhاۋدان
аудан
audan
Kyrgyz name
Kyrgyzوودان
оодан
oodan

Counties (simplified Chinese: ; traditional Chinese: ; pinyin: Xiàn) are found in the third level of the administrative hierarchy in provinces and autonomous regions and the second level in municipalities and Hainan, a level that is known as "county level" and also contains autonomous counties, county-level cities, banners, autonomous banners and city districts. There are 1,355 counties in mainland China out of a total of 2,851 county-level divisions.

The term xian is sometimes translated as "district" or "prefecture" when put in the context of Chinese history.