Provinces Autonomous regions Sub-provincial autonomous prefectures Autonomous prefectures Leagues (Aimag) (abolishing) Prefectures Provincial-controlled cities Provincial-controlled counties Autonomous counties County-level cities DistrictsEthnic districts Banners (Hoxu)Autonomous banners Shennongjia Forestry District Liuzhi Special District Wolong Special Administrative Region Workers and peasants districts Ethnic townships Towns Subdistricts Subdistrict bureaux Sum Ethnic sum County-controlled districts County-controlled district bureaux (obsolete) Management committees Town-level city Areas Villages · Gaqa · Ranches Village Committees Communities Capital cities New areas Autonomous administrative divisions National central cities History: before 1912, 1912–49, 1949–present The scope of this list is limited to capital cities of first-level administrative divisions such as provinces, autonomous regions, municipalities, and special administrative regions, also including sub-provincial cities which are governed by a province but administered independently in many ways from a province.
Sub-provincial cities have a status that is below that of the municipalities, which are independent and equivalent to provinces, but above other, regular prefecture-level cities, which are completely ruled by their respective provinces.
In total, there are five sub-provincial cities that are not themselves provincial capitals.
These five cities have been designated as "Cities with Independent Planning Status" (Chinese: 计划单列市; pinyin: Jìhuá Dānliè Shì).
With the exception of Fuzhou, the provincial capital of Fujian Province, the provincial capitals of the other four provinces listed above – Guangzhou, Shenyang, Jinan, and Hangzhou – are themselves sub-provincial cities.