While being a major source country of international students for western countries, China's position as a destination for international students has risen rapidly in the last decade. However, the reasons behind provincial China's inbound student flows are under-researched. To address this gap in the literature, taking Jiangsu as a case study, this study identifies a hierarchy of motivations behind international flows of students into provincial China. A survey was conducted using a questionnaire to elicit students' perceived importance of 18 motivations. We used ANOVA to explore differences in motivations in terms of student characteristics. The key motivations identified are the availability of scholarships and China's growing global importance. The findings suggest that pursuing high-quality education is not the main purpose for international students studying in provincial China at present. Instead, they seek to gain education experience in China with a view to future career perspectives, and provinces like Jiangsu are good alternatives for studying in metropolises. Policy implications are generated for governments and provincial universities to better meet the needs of international students in order to diversify and grow international student numbers in provincial China.