MTR from our Hohhot node runs continuous per-hop latency and loss measurements toward your target. From AS37963 (Alibaba Cloud), traffic first traverses Alibaba's internal backbone to an egress point — typically Beijing or Shanghai — before handing off to one of the three state carrier international gateways. The path taken depends on which carrier Alibaba has selected for the route, which can vary by destination prefix.

A typical MTR from Hohhot to a Frankfurt target will show: 1–3 internal Alibaba hops adding 15–25 ms to reach a Chinese international gateway, then a trans-Eurasia transit segment adding another 130–160 ms, arriving at Frankfurt-area infrastructure around 170–200 ms total. If the MTR shows a large latency jump at the international gateway hop itself, it often indicates congestion on the China-to-Europe international cable capacity — a common issue during Chinese business hours.

GFW border routers frequently do not respond to TTL-expired ICMP packets, meaning some hops in the MTR output will show as asterisks (*) even though traffic is passing through them normally. This is expected behaviour and not an indication of packet loss. Real loss in an MTR from China shows as percentage loss that persists from a specific hop through the destination — if loss appears only at intermediate hops and the destination still responds, those hops are simply not returning ICMP TTL-exceeded messages.

China's public internet is controlled by three state-owned carriers: China Telecom (AS4134), China Unicom (AS4837), and China Mobile (AS9808). These three operators hold exclusive rights to international gateway capacity, meaning all traffic entering or leaving China passes through their border routers. There is no neutral open IX market comparable to DE-CIX or AMS-IX — domestic peering occurs through state-managed exchange points in Beijing and Shanghai rather than through independent, carrier-neutral facilities.

The Great Firewall (GFW) operates at the international gateway level, filtering and blocking traffic based on IP, SNI, and deep packet inspection. BGP routes announced inside China are not affected by the GFW for domestic paths, but any traffic destined for or arriving from non-Chinese IP space crosses inspection points at each carrier's border. This means latency measurements from inside China to foreign destinations include not only geographic RTT but also any queuing or inspection delay at the border routers.

Our probe node is located in Hohhot, Inner Mongolia, running on Alibaba Cloud infrastructure (AS37963). Hohhot has become one of China's largest data center hubs due to cold climate reducing cooling costs and access to low-cost coal and wind electricity. Alibaba, China Telecom, and China Mobile all operate hyperscale facilities in the region. Hohhot connects to the rest of the Chinese backbone via China Telecom and Unicom long-haul fiber running east toward Beijing and south toward Shanghai.

International latency from China reflects both geography and the GFW border transit. Hohhot to Frankfurt runs approximately 170–195 ms over well-routed paths. Hohhot to London is around 180–200 ms. Hohhot to Los Angeles sits around 130–155 ms, as trans-Pacific cable capacity is better developed than China-Europe terrestrial routes. Within the Asia-Pacific region, Hohhot to Tokyo is approximately 60–80 ms and to Singapore around 90–110 ms. These figures vary by which state carrier handles the international segment.

Results from our Alibaba Cloud node in Hohhot reflect what a server looks like from inside Chinese state carrier infrastructure, specifically through AS37963 which peers with all three national carriers domestically. For sites targeting Chinese users, this is a meaningful test location — it shows whether your server is reachable from inside China, what latency Chinese users experience, and whether the GFW is affecting connectivity to your domain or IP range.