Shantou (汕头, formerly transliterated as Swatow) is a city of 784,000 in Guangdong province, in China.
Shantou was one of the original Special Economic Zones of China but failed to blossom like others cities such as Shenzhen, Xiamen and Zhuhai.
It is best known as the largest city for the chiu chow ethnic group in China. It is home the the only university in northeast Guangdong province, called Shantou University.
Some of the information on this page is erroneous and belongs to the Chaozhou article