A generation of migration, in and out of China.

This map starts empty in 1990. Every dot you’ll see appear after that is a packet of roughly fourteen thousand people (four thousand for the cooler direction) joining the Chinese diaspora abroad, or foreign-born residents arriving inside China, since that baseline year. By the end of 2024 about 7.7 million new outbound dots and 1.1 million inbound dots have piled up — warm for out, cool for in. The dots settle inside the country the migrants live in; the comet streaks are air traffic between five-year snapshots, not individuals.

Press play below to watch 1990 to 2024 unfold in thirty seconds.