Everyone knew they would simply drop the RoC to avoid confusion. A new design is pretty pointless.
if you see closely inside the circle, it still say Republic of China
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Comparing new to old, the graphics to text proportion of the new design are hard on the eyes. The bottom is too text heavy. Though the font used is better.
https://tw.news.yahoo.com/新版護照長這樣-吳釗燮-明年-月發行-舊護照效期內仍可用-022332672.html
My first thought as well. Would make it cleaner.
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Ok guys, a prize for the first one who can list the 3 differences between the old and the new passports.
Prominence of Republic of China severely reduced. Taiwan more prominent in English/Western languages for international border guards.
Roman letters no longer in a font unable to render letters. Uses a more western typeface.
護照 reduced in size.
Extra borders around text in emblem.
What do I win?
A brand-new Taiwanese passport! Just kidding…
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I don’t understand why the Chinese doesn’t say 中華民國臺灣 in Chinese or something.
Why only ROC?
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Just saw this article in English (Reuters). Glad to see the changes are relevant to international political discourse.
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- The new version of the passport is expected to be reissued in January 2021 .
- The cost is the same as the current passport ( NT$1,300 )
- If the original passport has not expired, then you can choose to reissue it or continue to use the original passport
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Interesting.
Whining from the PRC in 3,2,1…
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…to avoid upsetting folks in Kinmen? 
In over a quarter century of using a Taiwanese passport, I’ve only encountered a few times where the local officials were confused by the prominent “China” text…however, it was still annoying, and this new design would seem to address that issue. We’ll see.
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I’ve only seen it used as a benefit. Claim to be Chinese when it helps. Ten years ago I was entering Laos with some Taiwanese people. I convinced them to put “China” as their nationality on the visa application and they only got charged $20 for the landing visa. We ran into another Taiwanese person a few days later who reported using the same border crossing and getting charged $30 after writing “Taiwan” on the same form.
In this day and age I don’t see how being confused for a PRC person hurts in the limited situations where producing a passport would be required.
It’s the principle.
I do a fair bit of travelling, and several of the countries I’ve traveled to have more tolerant policies for Taiwanese nationals than they do for Chinese nationals. For example, one airline representative came close to refusing to let our group board a plane because they claimed the “China” on our passports meant that we were PRC nationals, and therefore needed a visa that we in fact didn’t need.
I don’t mind a few bucks extra here and there if I can more easily enter more countries.
As for Laos, the paper fill-in visa they gave me caused a hiccup when the officials at the border crossing from Hong Kong to Shenzhen couldn’t figure out what country it was from.
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Probably because a) PRC has been a complete cunt to Taiwan since day 1 and b) PRC people have a terrible reputation abroad.
I would loved to be confused for a Swedish person, for example. Unfortunately all we get are Chinese or Thai.
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Well for starters, there is the difference of being able to enter visa free to 130 countries against 30.
Then there is the law. Remember there was a guy or two who actually list their ROC nationality because of being stingy regarding the visa fee. They applied for a PRC ID and legally forfeited their rights.
Then you could also argue about how China is perceived within the context of COVID19.