Videos featuring smart toilet paper dispensers that require people to watch short ads to receive toilet paper strips in public toilets have gone viral in China.
Ever since it started its new era of booming national tourism, China has experimented with ingenious ways of preventing toilet paper waste. Back in 2017, international news outlets reported the introduction of facial scanners connected to toilet paper dispensers that only offered one 60-cm-long strip of paper per scan, or every nine minutes. It was reported that the system was implemented at popular tourism spots where people took as much toilet paper as possible for fear of not finding any when they came back later. AI technology was introduced in 2019, when toilet paper dispensers began dispensing strips of paper once every 10 minutes per individual user. But now, technology has evolved even more with toilet paper dispensers that play ads to release short strips of paper.
Last week, China Insider posted a short clip that quickly went viral on its Facebook page. In it, a young woman at a public toilet scans a QR code with her phone and then watches an ad on her handheld to activate the release of a strip of toilet paper from a dispenser. According to the news outlet, users have the option to watch an ad on their phones or pay 0.5 yuan ($0.07) for every strip of toilet paper they need.
Just like previously mentioned systems, the watch-an-ad model was implemented to cut down on toilet paper use, but the burning question is what do you do if you need to use the bathroom and don’t have your phone with you, or you run out of battery?
Cyberpunk Reality in #China: Toilet Paper Now Costs Money
In some public restrooms in China, toilet paper is no longer free.
For a small piece of paper, you now have to pay around 6 rubles — or watch an ad on a screen to get it.
A true glimpse of a futuristic, cashless society… pic.twitter.com/HMm2v0LyTA
— WORLD INSIGHT (@WORLDINSIGHTCH) September 8, 2025
