Some things are more easy as it seems to but to save Money visitors can get a Chinese Mobile Number very easy in any China Mobile Shop around the City. Here the steps, so follow these instructions on how to set up and recharge a Chine Mobile pre-pay account.

1. First you have to purchase a pre-pay sim card if you don’t already have one at the China Mobile Shop.
2. Put the SIM Card in your Mobile Phone and Switch on your Mobile.
3. Purchase a China Mobile pre-pay recharge card.
4. Scratch off the coat on the backside of the pre-pay recharge card to get the PIN number.
5. Dial the number 13800138000.
6. You will hear a automated service will start. Press 2 on your Mobile Phone for English. Wait some seconds then press again 2. Wait again then press 1 and #, and then 1 again to confirm.
7. You will now be prompted for the PIN number which is the scratched off bit on the backside of your pre-pay recharge card. After entering it hit the # key.
8. It will say something like ‘wait a minute’ before it confirms that your card is now charged and ready to go. If you have fat triangle fingers and screwed it up then go back to with the number 7 on your Mobile Phone..
9. If everything is right just hang up.

That’s it. At any time you should be able to ring up 10086 and find out how much credit you have left on the pre-pay account. Normally you’ll get 1-2 txt messages a day warning you before it’s over as well. If you’re expecting important calls it’s noteworthy to not let it expire as people won’t be able to call you if you don’t recharge the card.

China Unicom, full name China United Telecommunications Corporation, 中国联通, is a telecommunication operator in the People's Republic of China. 52.6% of the company is effectively held by the state-owned China Unicom (BVI) Limited and China United Telecommunications Corporation Limited, while the remainder is traded on the Shenzhen, Hong Kong and New York stock exchanges.

China Unicom was founded as a state-owned corporation, established on July 19, 1994, by the then Ministry of Electronic Industry (now Ministry of Information Industry) and approved by the State Council.

Started as a wireless paging and GSM mobile operator, it currently provides a wide range of services including nationwide GSM and CDMA mobile networks, long-distance, local calling, data communication, Internet services and IP telephony in mainland China, and has operated a CDMA network in Macau since 18 October 2006. As of the end of April 2008, the company had 125 million GSM subscribers and 43 million CDMA subscribers.

Compared to other mobile providers China Unicom is ranked as the second-largest CDMA provider in the world and the third-biggest mobile provider.

On June 2 2008, China Unicom announced its intention to sell its CDMA business and assets to China Telecom for a combined total of 110 billion RMB and to merge the remainder of the company, in a share swap valued at USD $56.3 billion (based on Unicom's stock last traded price) on June 2, 2008, with China Netcom.

Source: Wikipedia