The Chinese hotel star are determined by China National Tourism Bureau with a very strict standard. To get a quick idea of the hotel standard, e.g. Sheraton hotel generally has 5 stars, Holiday Inn hotel generally has 4 stars, Days Inn hotel generally has 3 stars.
To get more idea of the hotel standard, please read on.

3 Star Hotel
A 3 star hotel will provide AC room, 24 hours hot water shower, clean bed, desk, drawers and closet, carpet or wood floor, telephones in every room with international direct dial(IDD), mini-bar and refrigerator, color television sets, in-house movies, music, writing materials, western and Chinese dinning rooms with English-speaking attendants, coffee shop, banquet hall or function room, buffet breakfast and bar service foreign exchange, safe deposit boxes, store, camera film developing, fax and telex service, luggage storage, 24-hour laundry and dry-cleaning, wake-up calls, shoe polishing, and taxis, accept major credit cards and has medical services.

4 star hotel
Based on the equipments of 3 star hotels, 4 star hotels should have luxurious and spacious sound-proof rooms, low-noise toilets, and hair dryers. They should have guests and service elevators, background music, health club, swimming pool, sauna, business center, greenhouse, 24-hour doorman, babysitting services, 24-hour room service available. A guest reception and assistant manager should be available in the lobby 24 hours a day. Laundry should be returned by next day. The restaurants in four-star hotels should provide two kinds of Chinese food. Bar service should be available to one am. There should be a 24-hur coffee shop and a breakfast and dinner buffet. A clinic should be on-site. A business center with photocopying, typing and translation services should be available. (However there are some exceptions in Shanghai and Hong Kong since they have limited space they can not provide swimming pools)

5 star hotels
Five-Star hotels are usually palatial with huge lobbies, their standards not quite matching the best of Paris or New Year, but very close. Service should be better than the four-star hotels described above. There are many hotels of five-star international standard, just as good as hotels in Washington or Ottawa except for the standard of English. Some hotels have their own fleets of Mercedes limousines of Toyota vans that make regular runs to the airport or city center. At least two hotels have Rolls Royce. Many have executive floors with concierges, free continental breakfasts, and fast check-in. Many have magnificent ball rooms and lobbies and cater to foreign business people on expense accounts. They have the best western food and probably the best Chinese food in town, and the most luxurious breakfast buffets. Some leave chocolates on your pillow, or a rubber ducky on your bathtub, nice litter touches that bring a smile.

In remote areas or small villages which have no star hotels, the guests house or family Inn will always be equipped with clean bed, AC room, private bathroom with hot water shower.

In most circumstances, China Highlights Travel use hotels,
for Deluxe Class: 5 star hotels
for Comfortable Class: 4 star hotels(or 5 star by any possibility)
for Middle Class: 3 star hotels(or 4 star by any possibility)

However, please keep in mind that, China Highlights Travel do not choose hotels for our clients only based on hotel stars, we choose hotels for our clients based on many other factors as well, for example, feed back from our clients, location of the hotels, management of the hotels, market preference of the hotels (for example, some hotels are very experienced in serving Chinese clients but not Western Guests) and so on.

In some remote areas or small towns when there are no star hotels at all or the best hotels exist there are 3 or 4 stars, we will then use the highest star hotels as Deluxe Class which can be 4 or 3 star or even less, and we will use the second class hotels for the Comfortable Class while the third class hotels as Budget hotels.

You may also find that in some remote areas or villages, we use 1 hotel for all classes, which was because that hotel is the only acceptable hotel for China Highlights clients. But clients who choose Deluxe Class or Comfortable class do not misunderstood that we may over charge you for this hotel. We will charge you the same price as we charge those who choose budget class for this hotel.