How to Register for the CSCA Exam on csca.cn — Step by Step

CSCA Registration at a Glance

You register for the CSCA yourself, online, on the official site csca.cn. There is no paper form and no other site that can book a seat for you. Each sitting has its own registration window; once it closes, you wait for the next sitting.

What	The short answer
Where	csca.cn only: Registration Process in the menu, then Register Now
When	A fixed window for each sitting. For November 2026 it ran over 7 days, from 15 October 15:00 to 21 October 23:59, Beijing time
ID	Your original passport, the regular booklet kind. Nothing else is accepted
Photo	ID photo, 33 mm × 48 mm, white background, JPG of 40–200 KB, taken in the last 6 months
Fee	¥450 for 1 subject, ¥700 for 2 to 4 subjects
Payment	Visa or Mastercard issued outside mainland China, WeChat Pay or Alipay
Afterwards	A confirmation email, then an admission ticket to download and print before the exam

When Registration Opens

The CSCA publishes each sitting's registration dates on the csca.cn home page, beside the exam date, and that is the only place they are official. For the November 2026 sitting the window opened 30 days before the first exam day and closed 24 days before it, so a sitting can close more than three weeks ahead. If you plan to sit in a given month, have everything in the next section ready six weeks before it.

Every sitting from November 2026 to June 2027 has its own page here, which shows whether registration is open: November 2026, December 2026, January 2027, March 2027, April 2027 and June 2027. All of them are on the exam calendar.

Four Things to Have Ready First

1. A passport that will still be valid when your scores come out

The passport is the only identity document the CSCA accepts, both to register and on the day. It has to be a regular booklet passport, the original, valid from the day you register until your scores are released (within 10 working days of the exam). If yours expires before that, renew it first: the details you type must match the passport you will hold up to the camera.

2. An ID photo that meets the specification

The exam system uses the photo you upload for facial recognition, so a casual photo is not good enough. The exact requirements are further down.

3. A way to pay that works abroad

The fee is paid online as the last step: by Visa or Mastercard (credit, debit or prepaid) issued outside mainland China with international payments switched on, by WeChat Pay or by Alipay.

4. Your subjects, decided

You choose your papers when you book: one to four of Professional Chinese (Humanities or STEM stream), Mathematics, Physics and Chemistry. Mathematics is required of everyone; the rest depends on your programme, so check your university's admission page before you register. Our guides to the exam and to the two Chinese streams explain the rules.

How to Register, Step by Step

The official site describes registration in three stages: confirm the test arrangements, prepare your documents, then create an account and register online. In practice that is seven actions.

Step 1: Pick your sitting

On the csca.cn home page, find the sitting you want and check that its registration is open. Check the paper times too: they are in Beijing time, and a morning sitting falls in the middle of the night in Africa and Europe. Each of our sitting pages converts them for you.

Step 2: Create your account

Choose Sign Up at the top of csca.cn; the Chinese/English switch beside it changes the language. One account, and so one email address, can register one candidate only, and the site asks you to use your own information: brothers, sisters and classmates each need their own address. Use one you read every day, because the confirmation and the admission-ticket notice are sent to it.

Step 3: Fill in the registration form

Enter your name, gender, date of birth, nationality and passport number exactly as they are printed in your passport. A different spelling, a missing middle name or two digits swapped can stop you at the identity check on exam day.

Step 4: Upload your passport page and your photo

Upload a clear image of your passport's information page and the ID photo described further down. If the photo's head is cut off, tilted or small, replace it now rather than discovering it during facial recognition.

Step 5: Book your exam

Select the sitting, then your subjects. If you take Professional Chinese, choose the stream your programme requires. The CSCA is mainly a home-based online test and is adding test centres in some countries and regions: csca.cn says the home-based test is for places where a test centre is not yet accessible, so check which format your booking shows.

Step 6: Pay the fee

¥450 for one subject or ¥700 for two, three or four. Read the summary once more before you pay: once your admission ticket is generated, nothing on it can be changed. Fees, payment and refunds are covered in our fee guide.

Step 7: Keep the confirmation, then download your admission ticket

Your registration is complete when the confirmation email arrives. Before the exam you are emailed again when your admission ticket can be downloaded from your csca.cn account. Print it and check every line against your passport: you need the printed ticket and the original passport on the day.

Passport Rules That Catch People Out

• Only a regular booklet passport. Passport cards, diplomatic, official and service passports, national ID cards, driving licences, student cards and residence permits are all refused.
• Only the original. A photocopy, a scan or a picture on your phone does not count on exam day.
• Valid the whole way, from the day you register until your scores are released. An expired or damaged passport is treated as invalid.
• Signed, if it has a signature page.
• An exact match. The name, gender, date of birth, passport number and nationality in your registration must be the passport's.

If you cannot show a valid original passport that matches your registration, you are not allowed to sit and the fee is not refunded.

New passport after registering? If your passport is lost, renewed or changed, the CSCA Information Correction Request Form has to reach the CSCA through its official channel before your admission ticket is generated, with a scan of the new passport's information page and of the old one (or the official loss report).

The ID Photo: Exact Requirements

Item	Requirement
Type	A standard colour ID photo of you alone, taken within the last 6 months
Size	33 mm wide × 48 mm high, not stretched or squeezed
File	JPG or JPEG, between 40 KB and 200 KB
Background	Pure white, with no border and no shadow
Head	Centred and complete: about 15–22 mm wide and 28–33 mm from chin to crown, with 3–5 mm of space above it and at least 7 mm below the chin
Face	Looking straight at the camera, natural expression, eyes open, ears and eyebrows visible
Head coverings	No hats, headbands or sunglasses. A covering worn for religious reasons is allowed if the whole face and its outline stay clearly visible
Glasses	Better taken off. If you keep them on: no reflection, no dark lenses, eyes and eyebrows fully visible
Not accepted	Selfies, group or full-body photos, screenshots, scans or photocopies of a photo, beauty filters, retouching, AI-generated or edited faces

This matters most for the home-based test: the exam system compares your face with this photo before it lets you in. If recognition fails because the photo breaks the rules, you cannot sit the paper and the fee is not refunded. These are the measurements of a Chinese visa photo, so a shop that makes visa photos knows them; ask for the digital file.

Paying the Fee

• 1 subject: ¥450 (about US$62)
• 2, 3 or 4 subjects: ¥700 (about US$96)

The fee is charged in Chinese yuan, for each sitting, and paid online during registration. csca.cn accepts Visa and Mastercard credit, debit and prepaid cards issued outside mainland China, WeChat Pay and Alipay. Two checks prevent most failed payments: ask your bank to switch on international online payments for the card, and make sure the balance covers the fee plus your bank's conversion charge.

After You Register

1. Confirmation email. Keep it. If nothing has arrived after a day, look in your spam folder, then in your csca.cn account.
2. Admission ticket. Downloaded from your account before the exam; you are emailed when it is ready. It carries your ticket number, the date, your subjects and the instructions for the day.
3. Equipment check and mock test. For the home-based test both are compulsory, in the days the CSCA sets. You need the official test client on a Windows computer, a webcam, and a phone or tablet as a second camera: see the home-based exam guide.
4. Exam day. The system opens 60 minutes before the start. Have the printed ticket and your original passport on the desk.
5. Results. Within 10 working days of the exam, on your csca.cn account, where you download the score report.

Changing or Cancelling

You can withdraw and get the fee back, less any bank or service charges, only before your admission ticket is generated. After that, a refund is considered only for a documented emergency such as serious illness. A registration cannot be moved to another date or another subject, and missing the exam does not bring the fee back.

Eight Mistakes That Cost a Sitting

1. Waiting for the last day. The deadline is on Beijing time, and a payment problem takes time to fix.
2. Registering with a national ID card, or with a passport that expires before the results.
3. Typing a name that differs from the passport by one letter.
4. Uploading a selfie, a filtered photo or a scan of a printed photo.
5. Sharing one email address between two candidates.
6. Choosing the wrong Chinese stream, or leaving out a subject the programme requires.
7. Paying with a card that has international payments switched off.
8. Not opening the admission ticket until the night before.

Where to Get Help

The official support address is support@csca.cn, shown at the foot of every page of csca.cn. CSCA.HELPCSCA by Foorsa is an independent study site: we cannot see your registration, change it or register for you. Registration happens on csca.cn and nowhere else, so a site or a person asking you to pay the CSCA fee somewhere else is not the CSCA. More on what the official site does in our guide to csca.cn.

Registered? Use the Weeks You Have

Registration closes well before the exam (24 days before, for November 2026), which leaves a clear run of study time. Start from the syllabus for your papers, follow the one-month plan, and sit a full timed mock paper before the real one. Everything on CSCA.HELPCSCA by Foorsa is free.