Chinese Diploma & Transcript Translation

Three documents, not one

A Chinese academic file is usually three documents, and applicants usually send one.

Chinese universities issue a graduation certificate (毕业证书) and a degree certificate (学位证书) separately. They record different facts — that you completed the programme of study, and that the academic degree was conferred — and an evaluator or registrar generally wants to see both, alongside your transcript (成绩单). Sending only the degree certificate, or only the graduation certificate, is the most frequent reason a Chinese credential file is held as incomplete.

Nothing about that is a translation problem, which is exactly why it catches people. The translation is correct; the set is short a document. Send us everything you hold and we will tell you what looks to be missing before any work starts.

What the reviewer is actually checking

A credential evaluator or admissions officer reading your translated documents is doing three things:

Matching one person across several documents. Your name has to read the same way on the diploma, the transcript and the application. Chinese names romanised into pinyin can legitimately be written several ways, and different documents from different years often do write them differently. Tell us the exact spelling and name order on the passport you are applying with, and flag any document that disagrees — we render it consistently and note the variant rather than quietly choosing one.

Confirming the institution is the one it claims to be. Many Chinese universities have an official English name that is not a literal translation of the Chinese, and some have been renamed or merged since you graduated. The translation carries the name as printed, using the institution’s official English form where one exists, so the evaluator can match it against its own records.

Reading the record completely. Seals, the certificate or registration number, and the degree-conferring authority are often printed on the reverse. A translation that stops at the front of the document is incomplete, and incompleteness gets files returned. Send both sides of everything, including pages that look blank apart from a stamp.

Grades stay as printed

We do not convert Chinese grades into a US GPA, and you should be wary of anyone who offers to. A percentage score, a five-band scale, and credit hours expressed as 学时 all mean something specific in their own system, and deciding what they are worth in the US system is the evaluator’s professional judgement — it is the service you are paying the evaluator for.

So the translation reproduces the grades, the credits and the grading key exactly as they appear, including the scale printed on the back of many transcripts. That gives the evaluator everything it needs and leaves its judgement intact.

Verification reports

Some evaluators require more than a certified translation for mainland Chinese credentials: a verification report obtained from the Chinese authority that verifies academic records, through the CHSI system operated by CSSD. It is a separate step you take with that authority, not something a translator can produce.

Requirements differ between evaluators and change over time, so check your evaluator’s current requirements before ordering rather than relying on any third-party summary, including this one. If you already hold a verification report, send it with everything else — it is issued in Chinese and needs translating too.

Documents from Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macau

Records from Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macau, and older mainland certificates, are commonly in Traditional characters, and some documents carry both scripts. Our linguists work in both, and the certification is the same either way. Hong Kong records are often already partly in English; we translate what is in Chinese and reproduce the English as issued rather than re-translating it, so the document matches itself.

Translation is not evaluation

These are two different services and most applicants need both.

A certified translation renders your Chinese documents into English with a signed statement that the translation is complete and accurate. A credential evaluation is a separate professional opinion on what your qualification is equivalent to in the United States, issued by an evaluator you choose — for example a member of NACES. The translation is an input to the evaluation, not a substitute for it.

Taika provides the translation. We do not perform credential evaluations, and we are not affiliated with, endorsed by, or acting on behalf of any evaluator.

Send the set, get one answer

Multi-document sets are quoted as a single project with a single timeline. That is cheaper than ordering each record separately, and it is safer: the same terminology, institution name and name romanisation is applied across every document in the set, so the file reads as one coherent record instead of three translations that disagree with each other.

Request a quote for your documents, or if you only need a single diploma and know the page count, order a diploma translation from the store. For the wider picture, see academic credential translation and our guide to diploma and transcript translation for WES and ECE.