The Hard seat (Chinese: 硬座; pinyin: yìng zuò), abbreviated YZ, is the lowest class of seating in China Railway. It is the basic fare, somewhat similar to the economy class on an airplane.
Hard seat derives its name from the hard, wooden seats in the Mao era on regular passenger trains. Since the 1990's, "hard seat" on modern trains is not in fact, hard. Many hard seats are quite comfortable, but with respect to soft seat, hard seat carriages are usually more crowded (2+3 vs. 2+2), and people without seats may stand in hard seat carriages.
