Likes: Terracotta Army one of a kind / City wall cycling experience excellent, night view magical / Food amazing and cheap / Locals friendly and helpful. Complaints: Terracotta Army too crowded / Shaanxi History Museum booking difficult (not foreigner-friendly) / Insufficient English signage / Winter smog. TripAdvisor: Overall 4.5/5 (50,000+ reviews). Safety: Very safe.
Food: Qiongguo candy 15-30 yuan (6 months) / cured beef and mutton 80-150 yuan per jin (requires refrigeration) / stone-baked flatbread 10-20 yuan / dried persimmons 30-50 yuan (winter). Crafts: shadow puppets 30-200 yuan (fragile) / paper cuttings 15-50 yuan / replica Terracotta Warrior pottery figurines 10-100 yuan. Where to buy: Muslim Quarter (food) / Shuyuanmen (crafts) / Terracotta Army exit / airport (20-30% more expensive). Customs: Meat products may be confiscated when entering Europe, the US, Japan, or South Korea.
Airport: Xianyang International Airport → city center 40-60 min. Shuttle bus 25-35 yuan, metro Line 14 → Line 4 about 1.5h (8-10 yuan), taxi 100-150 yuan. Metro: Covers most core attractions (Terracotta Army, Shaanxi History Museum, Bell Tower, Giant Wild Goose Pagoda all have stations), scan QR code with Alipay/WeChat. DiDi: Available, foreigners need a domestic phone number + payment method. Taxi flagfall 8.5 yuan, metered. Day pass: Metro day pass 15 yuan (unlimited rides).
Spiciness: Overall mild to medium spicy; noodle dishes and paomo are not spicy; liangpi can be ordered without chili. Flavor: Predominantly salty and savory, with sour and spicy as secondary; extremely strong noodle culture. Halal: Muslim Quarter, Sajinqiao, and Dapiyuan have many halal restaurants, mainly beef and mutton, no pork and no alcohol. Vegetarian: Halal restaurants have vegetable dishes; strict vegan needs require communication. Must-eat: roujiamo, mutton paomo, Biangbiang noodles, liangpi, zenggao.
Restrictions: Some hotels lack foreign-related qualifications; three-star and above usually qualify. Booking: Filter for the "accepts foreign guests" option on Booking.com / Agoda / Trip.com. Documents: Original passport (bring a copy as backup). Recommendations: Sofitel Legend, Westin, Atour/JI Hotel (selected branches).
3-day classic: D1 Terracotta Army + Huaqing Palace, D2 City Wall + Beilin Museum + Bell and Drum Towers + Muslim Quarter, D3 Giant Wild Goose Pagoda + Datang Everbright City + Shaanxi History Museum (reservation required). 5-day in-depth: add a 1-day trip to Mount Hua + a 1-day trip to Hanyang Mausoleum/Qianling Mausoleum. Budget (per person): budget style 1200-1800 yuan / comfort style 2500-4000 yuan / light luxury style 5000-8000 yuan.
Yangrou paomo = the soul food of Xi'an locals. The mo in paomo is tuotuo mo (unleavened flatbread, nine-tenths cooked), not leavened bread! You must tear it yourself—the process of tearing the mo is social time (tearing the mo while chatting idly is just chatting). There is a golden standard for the size of the torn mo pieces: soybean-sized (about 0.5-1cm); too small and it turns to mush after absorbing the broth (called "hu le"), too large and it doesn't absorb flavor and stays dry and hard in the middle. An experienced mo-tearing master can tell at a glance whether you're a seasoned Shaanxi local—newbies tear uneven pieces, veterans tear evenly and finely. After tearing, the server takes it away to the kitchen—using scalding mutton broth to repeatedly "liu" (blanch the mo through with hot broth) several times, then adding sliced mutton + vermicelli + wood ear mushrooms + daylily buds + garlic sprouts and cilantro. There are two ways of cooking: shui wei cheng (more broth, less mo, good for drinking the broth) / kou tang (when you finish eating, exactly one mouthful of broth remains at the bottom of the bowl—this best shows skill) / gan pao (all the broth is absorbed by the mo, and the bowl is dry after eating). Served with sweet garlic and chili sauce. Xi'an recommendations: Tongshengxiang (a century-old time-honored brand) / Lao Sun Jia / Yi Zhen Lou.