This study explores China’s English-medium instruction (EMI) policies in higher education (HE) from three viewpoints: language ideology, language management and language practice (LP). It finds that China’s EMI policies target bidirectional internationalisation, for both outbound Chinese students and inbound international students. It also reveals that the actual key problems in China’s EMI policies lie in LPs: confined EMI courses or programmes, and asymmetrical number of international degree students. It is claimed that EMI policies should be evolved together with disciplinary promotion and Chinese-medium instruction policies.