China · Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region
Where to Stay in Tongliao, Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region
Tongliao is a city on the Khorchin grasslands of eastern Inner Mongolia, China, a heartland of the Mongol banners.
Find your area →
Where to stay in Tongliao
The right area depends on your trip — here's what each neighbourhood is best for.
Where you stay in Tongliao turns on the city centre. The downtown streets keep the shops, the stations, and the markets within reach, and staying downtown suits anyone here for the city. The wide avenues run straight and long.
Rooms sit among the grassland-city blocks. Out toward the steppe and the sandy land, the city gives way to open grassland. A room near the edge trades the centre for the herds, the yurts, and the road to the lamasery.
The open steppe rolls past the edge. If you want the shops and the stations, stay downtown; if you want the grassland, take a room near the edge. Either way, the steppe is close at hand.
About Tongliao
Tongliao is a grassland city of the Khorchin Mongols.
What is Tongliao known for?
It stands where the eastern grasslands meet the sandy land, in the country of the Khorchin banners, and it keeps a great Tibetan-Buddhist lamasery in the hills, the old tombs of the Khitan kings, and the palace of a famous Mongol prince. Herds still graze the open steppe. Grassland and temple mark the city.
What are the main landmarks in Tongliao?
The Huree lamasery rises in the hills near Tongliao. The great Tibetan-Buddhist monastery, one of the largest on the eastern grasslands, spreads its halls over the slopes, the emblem of the region, above the plain. Old tombs dot the steppe.
The Liao tombs of the Khitan kings and the palace of Prince Sengge Rinchen lie out on the grassland, while ancient city ruins mark the plains around Tongliao.
What is the history of Tongliao?
Tongliao has been Mongol grassland since old times. Here on the eastern steppe lived the Khorchin, a great Mongol people descended from the kin of Genghis Khan, who herded their flocks across the open plains. Kings had ruled here before them.
Long ago the Khitan of the Liao dynasty held this land and left their tombs and ruined cities on the grassland, before the Mongols came. The banners kept their princes under the Qing. The Manchu emperors ruled the Khorchin through their own Mongol lords, and the region gave the dynasty a famous general, Sengge Rinchen, whose palace still stands on the plain.
Lamas built a great monastery here too. In the hills rose the Huree lamasery, one of the largest in eastern Mongolia, where monks kept the Tibetan faith. Later the grassland town grew into a city.
The herds still graze the open steppe. Tongliao keeps its grasslands and its temples in the east.
Where is Tongliao?
Tongliao lies on the eastern grasslands of Inner Mongolia in northern China. The city sits on a broad plain where the Khorchin grasslands give way to the sandy land, on the West Liao river, north of the Yan mountains. Open steppe rolls around the town.
The sandy land spreads to the south.
What is the climate of Tongliao?
Tongliao has a dry continental climate. Warm summers and long, bitter winters cross the grasslands, and the wind sweeps sand and cold across the plain, with little rain and wide swings from day to night. Dust storms blow off the sandy land in spring.
The steppe air stays dry and clear.
How do you get to Tongliao?
Tongliao lies on the grasslands of eastern Inner Mongolia, north of Shenyang. Trains and the expressway run to it across the steppe from Shenyang and the northeast, and an airport links the city. Buses reach the grassland towns around.
Most arrive by rail across the steppe.
More cities in Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region
Updated August 2026