The sector is held by China Eastern Airlines and United Airlines.
Airport pair · hand carry reference
SFO San Francisco to PVG Shanghai
San Francisco International, the United States, to Pudong International, China. Computed from the scheduled network held on 2026-09-07.
- Nonstop
- About once a day
- Great circle
- 9,877 km
- Block, estimated
- 12h 24m
- Door to door
- 19h 09m
What SFO to PVG looks like
The SFO to PVG sector, the carriers on it and the flying time, before anything is promised to anybody.
San Francisco SFO to Shanghai PVG is an ultra long sector of 9,877 km by great circle, flown nonstop about once a day.
At the cruise speed this site models for 9,877 km, 880 km an hour, and thirty minutes of taxi at the two ends, the flight blocks at about 12h 24m.
San Francisco SFO is a major hub in the network held here, 189 scheduled destinations and 656.9 departures a day. Shanghai PVG has 206 destinations and 786.7 departures a day.
Shanghai runs 16 hours ahead of San Francisco in January and 15 hours ahead in July, because the two ends do not change their clocks together.
The pair sits between the Americas and Asia Pacific, a corridor where the site already publishes 16 written lanes that go into customs and ground detail this page does not.
Who flies the sector, and how often
Average daily frequencies on SFO to PVG from the scheduled route statistics, both directions, with the operating carriers named.
| Direction | Flights a day | Flights a week | Operated by |
|---|---|---|---|
| SFO to PVG | 1.57 | 11 | China Eastern Airlines, United Airlines |
| PVG to SFO | 1.57 | 11 | China Eastern Airlines, United Airlines |
Two carriers hold the sector, China Eastern Airlines and United Airlines, which gives a missed departure somewhere to go without leaving the nonstop.
Between them the two directions put about 22 departures a week on SFO to PVG, which is the number that decides whether a seat can be found today or on Thursday.
The clock from collection to signature
The same ground timings the route calculator starts from, applied to the 12h 24m block time on SFO to PVG. Change any of them in the tool further down and the total moves with them.
| Stage | Allowed | Elapsed |
|---|---|---|
| Collection and the run to SFO | 90 min | 1h 30m |
| At SFO before departure | 180 min | 4h 30m |
| SFO to PVG in the air, estimated | 744 min | 16h 54m |
| Formalities at PVG | 90 min | 18h 24m |
| Delivery run in Shanghai | 45 min | 19h 09m |
| Door to door | 1,149 min | 19h 09m |
On the desk standard ground timings, ninety minutes to collect and reach the airport, three hours at the airport before departure, ninety minutes of arrival formalities and a forty five minute delivery run, the door to door figure for SFO to PVG is 19h 09m.
A courier who leaves San Francisco at 09:00 local is on the ground in Shanghai at about 13:24 local and at the door by 15:39 the following day.
Working backwards from a six in the evening handover in Shanghai, nothing leaving San Francisco inside a normal working day arrives in time, so this pair is an overnight and a next morning delivery rather than a same day one.
At 19h 09m the mission is past the sixteen hour duty day a single courier is planned against, so it is quoted with a rest at the far end or with a second courier, and never as a turnaround.
When the nonstop does not work
Every airport that joins the two ends, ranked by when they land, among the ones whose weaker leg is dependable enough to plan on. Connection time is allowed for the size of the hub. 42 of them join SFO to PVG.
| Connecting at | SFO to hub, flights a day | Hub to PVG, flights a day | Track, km | Estimated, gate to gate |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Osaka KIX | 1 | 16 | 9,999 | 14h 08m |
| Seoul ICN | 7.71 | 22.43 | 9,907 | 14h 15m |
| Tokyo HND | 3.43 | 4.43 | 10,023 | 14h 27m |
| Tokyo NRT | 1.14 | 14.86 | 10,024 | 14h 28m |
| Seattle SEA | 23.71 | 1.14 | 10,281 | 14h 43m |
| Vancouver YVR | 10.43 | 1.43 | 10,305 | 14h 46m |
One nonstop a day means one chance a day, so the connections below are what a consignment that arrives at SFO in the afternoon actually flies on.
42 airports connect the two ends on the scheduled network held here. The quickest of the dependable ones is Osaka KIX, where the weaker of the two legs still runs about once a day.
Through KIX the routing covers 9,999 km against the 9,877 km nonstop track and takes about 14h 08m in the air and on the ground at the hub, allowing 60 minutes to connect at an airport of that size.
That is only 1h 44m more than the nonstop, which is close enough that a connection is worth taking when the nonstop is full or badly timed.
Behind it, Seoul ICN at 14h 15m and Tokyo HND at 14h 27m hold the same connection, so a booking has three hubs to try before it has to wait for the nonstop.
If nothing suitable leaves San Francisco, Oakland OAK is 18 km away by great circle and carries 89 scheduled destinations of its own, which is usually a shorter road transfer than a lost day.
If nothing suitable leaves Shanghai, Shanghai SHA is 45 km away by great circle and carries 60 scheduled destinations of its own, which is usually a shorter road transfer than a lost day.
Restricted hours at either end
Widely documented operating restrictions, checked 2026-09-07. Exemptions and seasonal variations exist, so confirm with the carrier before relying on any of them.
Shanghai PVG, night operations: Operates around the clock.
Industry within reach of the two ends
Public manufacturing and research sites whose logistics run through SFO or PVG. Listed as industrial geography, not as customers of anyone.
- Genentech, South San FranciscoBiotechnology research and manufacturing. The original biotech cluster, and still the densest. Logistics through San Francisco SFO.
Plan San Francisco to Shanghai yourself
The same tool the dispatchers use, open to anybody and free. It is loaded with this pair already. Change either end, add a stopover or a preferred airline, and it works out the connection, the transit and the door to door clock, with the real departures underneath. Put it on your own site if it is useful to you.
min
min
min
min
Restrictions
Where this came from, and where to look next
- Carriers and frequencies: AeroDataBox scheduled route statistics, retrieved 2026-09-07. Average daily flights, not a timetable.
- Distances: great circle from published coordinates. They read short against a flown track, which is why the block time above applies a factor to them.
- Block and connection times: the same model the route calculator lower down this page runs, at the same rounding.
- Restrictions: the airport notes file, checked 2026-09-07.
- Industrial sites: public company information. Nothing here says or implies that any company named is a customer of any courier operator.
Who publishes this. OnBoard Courier is a placement desk in Dubai. An assignment is carried out by a vetted partner operator, with the desk as the single point of contact from the quote to the signature. This page exists because our own dispatchers need the answer for SFO to PVG in the twenty minutes before a promise is made, and a reference only one operator can read is not a reference. Free to read, quote and cite. Found an error? Tell us and we will correct it.
If you need something moved rather than looked up, the desk prices a hand carry in fifteen minutes.
- The SFO airport entry
- The PVG airport entry
- Hand carry into the United States
- Hand carry into China
- The written lane, Dubai to San Francisco
- The written lane, San Francisco to Taipei
- The written lane, Seoul to San Francisco
- The route calculator
More pairs through SFO and PVG: Taipei to Shanghai, Shanghai to Guangzhou, Hong Kong to Shanghai, London to Shanghai, Barcelona to Shanghai, Amsterdam to Shanghai, Shanghai to Shenzhen, Milan to Shanghai.