12306.cn is a site constructed by China Academy of Railway Science. It is now the only official site for a passenger to buy railway tickets in mainland China. In peak time like the spring festival or the national day holiday, the site suffers much from the visitors, making it very hard for an ordinary passenger to buy a ticket online. Since 2012, lots of news about this site has been reported. To buy a suitable ticket, many people have to use some extra plugins, which may be harmful to their computer systems. According to the author’s test, by using this site flexibly, one can buy his suitable railway ticket easier. In this article, some strategies are introduced so that the readers can use this site in a more flexible way.

It is of great importance to plan the journey carefully before buying tickets. There was a news saying that someone bought 17 constant days of railway tickets because he cannot decide when to start his journey. This implies once more about planning the journey carefully. Plan a journey can make one familiar with his route and try his best to optimize it.
To plan a journey, one need to think over many factors. Here are some examples:

• What train to take? / What route to move on?
• Is the time consumed in the journey as short as imagined? / Is the price suitable?
• Is the arriving time proper? / Is transfer required? If yes, where? How?
• Am I qualified to buy the ticket online? / Can the train I take be bought online? / When will my ticket start to sale? / Are there any limitations if I want to modify or cancel my journey?

Here is an example showing a plan from Chongqing-Lanzhou:

In August 2016, Z223 should be the best choice from Chongqing to Lanzhou, but it is not operated every day. Once Z223 is not operated on one day, Z322 will be operated. Then, one can take K9431 to Nanchong North and then D5125 to Guangyuan, and use Z322 to Lanzhou.
According to the author’s experiments, it is very hard for a passenger to get a ticket from Guangyuan to Lanzhou taking Z322, even if a hard seat. However, there is certain probability for a passenger to get a ticket for K542, maybe a hard sleeper. Therefore, Z223 and K542 should be better choices. If a passenger have to arrive Lanzhou in the morning, not in the noon, he may have to take Z223 or Z322 instead.

Ordinarily speaking, a passenger queries the information about left ticket first, and then he logs in and fills in the information. However, this method is not suitable when the number of left ticket is few. The log in process usually takes about 2 to 3 minutes, during which the left ticket may have been sold out.
Thus, the proper sequence suggested by the author is to log in first, then query the information, if one wants to buy a ticket. This sequence will save much time especially when few tickets reside.
It is also dependent greatly on sequence when a set of tickets is required to buy. The long-distance, hardly-to-buy tickets should be bought in prior order.
Take Chongqing-Lanzhou as an example, if transferring in Guangyuan is decided, Z322 Guangyuan-Lanzhou should be put in the 1st place to buy because the distance is long and the tickets are hard to buy.
In this example, if K9431 or D5125 is bought at first, once the journey is modified because no tickets for Z322, the passenger has to cancel the ticket for the ticket he bought before, which is a trouble process.

To avoid abusion, 12306.cn sets cache in query process. Having the cache, the query result remains the same when the depart and end station still the same in a certain time. The author’s experiments show that there are some approaches to avoid it. To get up-to-date information, one can try the method below:
First, use another browser or another equipment to cross query at the same time. DO NOT LOG IN IN ANOTHER MACHINE OR BROWSER!
Second, modify the station name to a station at the same city shown altogether in 12306.cn.
Still, take Guangyuan-Lanzhou as an example.

Pay attention to the red line in the pictures. If one uses Guangyuan to Zhongchuan Airport, he will find 0 soft sleeper, 15 no seat for Z222, 6 no seat for K1502. Then, he uses Guangyuan to Lanzhou, and will find 1 soft sleeper, 16 no seat for Z222 and >20 no seat (marked as “有”) for K1502. Under this condition, Guangyuan, Guangyuan South; Lanzhou, Lanzhou East, Lanzhou West, Lanzhou New Area, Zhongchuan Airport will form 10 groups of query list, leading the same query but may get different results.
When modify the journey, this function is still suitable, but some techniques are required:
Here, the browser is Firefox and Firebug is installed for use. Move the mouse to the end station box and right click, select the bottom one:

As can be seen from the code, there is a readonly attribute which limits the modification of the end station.

According to experiments, it is the value of the box, not what is shown in the box that really works. Type the telegram code without a hyphen, (like HKJ, means Hekounan station) in the value box in the red oval to query the ticket and get the up-to-date result. One have to delete the readonly attribute in some cases.
In fact, the result sometimes still remains the same, but to do this is much better for acquiring newest information.

• Please watch the query result carefully. By doing so, the depart station of some trains may get modified.

Query Chongqing-Beijing, K508 from Chongqing to Beijing West and others are shown. In this case, one could catch the train at Chongqing station.

Query Beibei to Beijing, the depart station of K508 will become Beibei (K508 will stop at Beibei while others will not). Here, if one wants to buy K508, he must catch the train at Beibei station.

• The modification of end station or depart station to other cities may not work if one wants to modify the journey.

The best time to get the tickets is the time they firstly released. It usually costs about three minutes in peak time for tickets to be sold out. Therefore, it is suggested to buy tickets at that time.
According to experience, the tickets are firstly shown on the time sections correspond to the train’s departure, like 0:00-6:00, 6:00-12:00, 12:00-18:00 and 18:00-24:00. Click these sections and keep reloading the query, and tickets may be shown at once.
If this section is missed, there are two key sections to notice: 9:00, five days before departure and 21:30, one day before departure. Many tickets remain will be released at this time.

Both results are queried at 21:30, Aug. 20, 2016. Pay attention to the results in red.

There is also another strategy for buying tickets: For trains stop at some “small stations” near “big station” and the “big station”, the query result to “small stations” may usually be that to the “big station”. For example, a ticket from Nanjing to Xi’an is required. To query Nanjing to Xi’an directly, found nothing but no seat. Then, modify the end station box to Weinan, Weinan North or Weinan South, there may be sleepers like this:

Then, modify the end station to Xi’an again

This article introduces the method of the flexible use of 12306.cn, the only official site of buying railway tickets in China Mainland. From this article, some methods are shown to get a railway ticket from 12306.cn easier and more efficiently. Wish the contents in this article of help to the ones who want to buy tickets, especially in peak time.