How is it done in China?
Everyday topic
China's Civil Code puts it in one short article. Article 17: a natural person aged eighteen or over is an adult; a natural person under eighteen is a minor. There is no national coming-of-age rite or holiday. Adulthood is the boundary of civil capacity, and it falls on a birthday rather than on a shared date. Schools may hold an eighteenth-birthday ceremony, but that is a school event, not an institutional arrangement. Even after eighteen, marriage waits until twenty-two for men or twenty for women, leaving several years between the two lines.
What is this topic?
Legal adulthood and a coming-of-age ceremony are not the same line.
Taiwan, mainland China, and India place civil adulthood at 18; Japan lowered it to 18 in 2022, although many local adult ceremonies still focus on 20.
Indonesia gives an identity card and voting rights at 17 but ends the child-protection definition at 18, Brazil has an 18-year line with routes to earlier full capacity, and the United States assigns voting, drinking, contracting, and other rights to different ages.
This guide separates law, ritual, family recognition, and personal choice.
🗳️ What about you?
Asked by the 🇺🇸 English community
For the 🇹🇼 中文(台灣) community
Is there a rite where you live that says someone has grown up? At what age?
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Sources and dates
Dates follow local time zones, calendars, and official notices. Check the source when a date is estimated or locally variable.