Temple Visits & Prayers · Lunar New Year

Lunar New Year Tradition

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庙会

Miào Huì

Temple Visits & Prayers

Where incense smoke rises to heaven — bringing prayers, gratitude, and hope for the year ahead.

Quick Facts

Chinese Name

庙会 (Miào Huì) / 拜神 (Bài Shén)

Peak Time

New Year's Eve midnight through first days

Common Temples

Buddhist, Taoist, and folk religion temples

Offering

Incense sticks, fruit, flowers, paper goods

Temple Fair

Games, food stalls, performances alongside worship

Key Prayer

Health, prosperity, family harmony

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The Midnight Rush

First to the Temple

One of the most dramatic Lunar New Year temple customs is the race to be first to offer incense in the new year — known as "grabbing the first incense" (抢头香, qiǎng tóu xiāng). At the stroke of midnight on New Year's Eve, crowds surge through temple gates to light and plant the first sticks of incense. Being first is believed to bring extraordinary blessing and good fortune for the entire year.

Major temples can see tens or hundreds of thousands of visitors in the first hours of New Year's Day. Queues begin forming well before midnight, and the atmosphere is electric — part spiritual urgency, part festive excitement, all deeply human in its expression of hope for the year ahead.

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Temple Fairs

More Than Just Prayer

Historically, temples were the social and commercial centers of Chinese communities, and the New Year temple fair (庙会) has always combined spiritual practice with lively community gathering. Around the main worship areas, vendors set up stalls selling New Year goods, snacks, folk art, and traditional crafts.

Performances of traditional arts take place — acrobats, puppet theatre, face-changing (变脸), folk music, and stilt-walkers. Children play traditional games; families eat street food; fortune tellers and calligraphers offer their services. The result is a festive carnival atmosphere that wraps spiritual devotion in layers of joy, community, and celebration.

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Offerings & Prayers

What People Bring & Ask

Typical offerings at New Year temple visits include incense sticks, fresh fruit (especially oranges and pomelos), flowers, and in some traditions, paper goods to be burned. The prayers offered are overwhelmingly practical and heartfelt: health for aging parents, good exam results for children, business success for the family's livelihood, harmony in marriage, and the safe arrival of a hoped-for child.

Fortune-telling is a major aspect of temple New Year culture. Visitors shake bamboo cylinders filled with numbered sticks until one falls out (鬮, qiú), then receive a written fortune corresponding to that number from a temple attendant. This fortune reading for the year ahead is taken seriously by many, and lines for popular fortune-tellers at famous temples can stretch for hours.

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How To

Step by Step

Prepare your offeringsBring incense sticks, fresh oranges or other fruit, and flowers. Many temples sell offerings at the gate if you haven't brought your own.

Enter respectfullyRemove hats, speak softly, and move with quiet reverence in the main worship halls. Photography may be restricted in certain areas.

Light incense & bowLight your incense, hold it in both hands at forehead height, and bow three times toward the deity — expressing gratitude, making your prayers, and stating your intentions.

Explore the fairOnce your devotions are complete, enjoy the temple fair — the food stalls, performances, and festive market that surround the spiritual center.

Did You Know

Temple visits during Lunar New Year are among the most spiritually resonant moments of the festival. Whether one is devoutly religious or simply observing cultural tradition, standing in the courtyard of an ancient temple as incense smoke coils upward, surrounded by the murmur of prayers, is a profound and moving experience.