The periodization follows standard scholarly frameworks (Qing Xitai, History of Chinese Daoism; Ren Jiyu, History of Chinese Daoism; Kohn, Daoism Handbook). Dates are CE; uncertain dates are marked "c."
In the pre-Qin period there was not yet an organized religion called "Daoism" (Daojiao), but most of the ideas, beliefs, and technical resources on which later Daoism would draw took shape in this era. The first was the Daoist philosophy (Daojia) centered on the Laozi (Daodejing): it held the Dao (the Way) to be the origin of the myriad things, and advocated Wuwei (Non-action), Ziran (Naturalness, Self-so), and "guarding the soft"; during the Warring States, Zhuang Zhou and his followers developed these ideas into notions such as the equalization of things, free wandering, Sitting in Oblivion, and Fasting of the Mind, and the text became the foundational scripture of Daoist doctrine and cultivation theory. The second was the Huang–Lao Learning that arose at the Jixia Academy in the state of Qi: attributed to the Yellow Emperor (Huangdi), it blended Daoist philosophy with the arts of law and administrative technique, laying the groundwork for the statecraft of the early Han and for the later Huang–Lao Daoism. The third was the accumulation of shamanic invocation, magical arts (fangshu), and beliefs in immortals: the shamanic sacrificial rites seen in the Shanhaijing (Classic of Mountains and Seas) and the Chuci (Songs of Chu), the fangshi (masters of methods) of the Yan-Qi coast with their legends of the Three Divine Mountains, Zou Yan's theory of Yin and Yang and the Five Phases, and life-nourishing techniques such as Daoyin (Guiding and Stretching), circulating qi, bedchamber arts, and ingesting herbs and minerals (as attested by the Warring States-era Inscription on the Jade Pendant for Circulating Qi) — all of these were absorbed by the Fangxian Dao (Way of the Fangshi and Immortality-seekers) of the Qin and Han. The dates of Laozi himself and of the composition of the Daodejing remain disputed among scholars; it is generally held that Laozi was roughly contemporary with Confucius or slightly later, and that the Daodejing was compiled in the early-to-middle Warring States period — the 1993 Guodian bamboo-slip manuscripts and the 1973 Mawangdui silk manuscripts have provided material evidence for its early textual history. This was the era of Daoist philosophy (Daojia) rather than Daoist religion (Daojiao), but later Daoism venerated Laozi as its founding teacher and the Daodejing as its sacred scripture, tracing its orthodox lineage back to this period.
The Qin and Han were a crucial stage in the "prehistory" of Daoism. Qin Shi Huang and Emperor Wu of Han both put great faith in fangshi (masters of methods): they dispatched Xu Fu to sea, performed the Feng and Shan sacrifices at Mount Tai, and sought drugs of immortality; fangshi from the Yan-Qi coast were active at court under the name Fangxian Dao, and the activities of Li Shaojun, Luan Da, and Gongsun Qing — sacrificing to the stove god and transmuting cinnabar into gold — represent an early form of Waidan (External Alchemy) and the cult of immortals. In the early Han, Huang–Lao Learning became the guiding doctrine of statecraft (the Rule of Wen and Jing), Empress Dowager Dou favored Huang–Lao, and the Huainanzi represents the culmination of Huang–Lao Daoist philosophy combined with beliefs in immortality. After Emperor Wu proclaimed Confucianism the sole orthodoxy, Huang–Lao Learning withdrew from the political stage and turned toward popular practice and the nourishing of life, gradually shifting from a "learning" (xue) to a "way" (dao): in the early Eastern Han, Laozi was deified; under Emperor Huan of Han, in 165–166 envoys were sent successively to sacrifice to Laozi at Ku County, and the court itself performed sacrifices to "Huang–Lao and the Buddha" — the term "Huang–Lao Dao" appears in the historical record at this time, marking Laozi's transformation from philosopher to founding deity. At the same time, prognostication and apocryphal texts (chenwei) and theories of portents and calamities flourished, and "heavenly writs" of the Scripture of Great Peace (Taiping jing) lineage appeared successively under Emperors Cheng and Shun, becoming the wellspring of the Way of Great Peace (Taiping Dao); the Zhouyi cantong qi combined the study of the Book of Changes, Huang–Lao thought, and the arts of the furnace, and was later revered as the "King of Alchemical Scriptures for all ages." In this period magical arts, Huang–Lao thought, belief in immortals, and popular sacrificial cults converged, and an institutionalized religious community was on the verge of emerging.
In the mid-to-late Eastern Han, on the foundation of Huang–Lao Dao, belief in the Taiping jing, and popular shamanic cults, religious communities emerged that possessed scriptures, organization, and ritual — scholars generally take this as the marker of Daoism's formal founding. The first was the Way of Great Peace (Taiping Dao): Zhang Jiao revered the Taiping jing, healed the sick with talisman-water and incantations, styled himself the "Great Worthy and Good Teacher," and within a decade or so gathered several hundred thousand followers spread across eight provinces including Qing, Xu, You, and Ji; he organized them into thirty-six "divisions" (fang), and in 184 (a jiazi year) rose in rebellion under the slogan "The Azure Heaven is already dead; the Yellow Heaven shall be established" — known to history as the Yellow Turban Rebellion. Though suppressed, it shook the foundations of the Han state. The second was the Way of the Five Pecks of Rice (Wudoumi Dao, the Celestial Masters): Zhang Daoling (personal name Zhang Ling) entered Shu during the reign of Emperor Shun of Han and, according to tradition, received the mandate of the Supreme Venerable Sovereign (Laojun) at Mount Heming in 142 to become "Celestial Master," founding the Way of the Covenant of Orthodox Unity with Its Awesome Power. He took the Daodejing as his principal scripture and composed the Xiang'er Commentary on the Laozi (some say it was written by Zhang Lu); converts paid five pecks of rice to join, hence the name. Zhang Daoling transmitted the teaching to his son Zhang Heng and grandson Zhang Lu; Zhang Lu held Hanzhong for nearly thirty years, establishing the "twenty-four parishes," libationers, and "charity lodges," and used "handwritten confessions to the Three Officials" to pray for the sick, forming a local theocratic regime. In 215 Zhang Lu surrendered to Cao Cao, and large numbers of Celestial Masters followers were relocated to the north, setting the stage for the northward spread of Daoism in the Wei-Jin period. By this stage Daoism already possessed the rudiments of a founding deity, scriptures, a religious community, precepts, and ritual protocol — a decisive turning point from "Daoist philosophy" and "magical arts" to organized "Daoist religion."
The Wei-Jin period saw Daoism move from a local religious community toward a nationwide religion, and from popular belief toward aristocratization and canon formation. After Zhang Lu surrendered to Cao Cao, the followers of the Celestial Masters migrated north with him, penetrating deep into the great clans of the Central Plain and Jiangnan; eminent families such as the Wang (Wang Xizhi) and the Xi (Xi Yin) all venerated the Celestial Masters, though this period also saw problems of loose organization and libationers privately appointing themselves. From the end of the Western Jin into the Eastern Jin, warfare in the north drove large populations south, and in Jiangnan the Celestial Masters tradition merged with local magical arts and shamanic customs. The most important intellectual achievement of this period was Ge Hong's (283–343) Baopuzi: the Inner Chapters systematically argue that immortality can be learned, that the golden elixir is paramount, and combine this with the practice of circulating qi, bedchamber arts, and daoyin, while the Outer Chapters discuss worldly affairs — together they represent the culmination of the theory of immortality-seeking Daoism, and institutionalized the alchemical tradition of the Ge Xuan–Zheng Yin lineage; in his later years Ge Hong practiced alchemy on Mount Luofu. In the mid-to-late Eastern Jin, two major new scriptural traditions arose among the aristocratic Daoism of Jiangnan: around 364–370, Yang Xi, Xu Mi, and Xu Hui received revealed texts at Jurong's Mount Mao (Maoshan), transmitting the Perfect Scripture of the Great Cavern (Dadong zhenjing) and other Shangqing scriptures, which emphasized visualization, scripture recitation, and the gods residing within the body, and which venerated Wei Huacun as first-generation patriarch; and around 397–402, Ge Chaofu and others composed the Lingbao scriptures centered on the Wondrous Scripture of Limitless Salvation (Duren jing), absorbing the Buddhist concepts of kalpa-cycles and rebirth, emphasizing zhai and jiao ritual protocols, and stressing universal salvation. At the same time, the Sanhuang jing (Scripture of the Three Sovereigns) lineage came to form the Dongshen section of the later "Three Caverns." At the end of the Eastern Jin, Sun En and Lu Xun raised rebellions in the name of the Celestial Masters (399–411), which both demonstrated Daoism's power to mobilize the populace and prompted the religious community to seek reform. The popularity of the Wei-Jin Study of the Mysterious (Xuanxue) and its "Three Mysteries" (the Laozi, the Zhuangzi, and the Book of Changes) meanwhile supplied the philosophical vocabulary for the doctrinal systematization of Daoism.
The Northern and Southern Dynasties were an era of "reform, consolidation, and official recognition" for Daoism, with distinct developments in north and south. In the north: Kou Qianzhi, a Daoist priest of Mount Song, claimed that in 415 and again in 423 he received from the Supreme Venerable Sovereign (Laojun) and Li Puwen the revealed texts New Code of Precepts Chanted in the Clouds and the Perfected Scripture of the Register Chart, "purifying and reordering Daoism, doing away with the false methods of the Three Zhangs, the rice-and-cash taxes, and the technique of the union of male and female energies," replacing the popular practices of the old Celestial Masters with ritual propriety, the chanting of precepts, and zhai and jiao rites; in 424 he went to Pingcheng with an introduction from Cui Hao, and in 440 Emperor Taiwu of Northern Wei changed the reign title to "Taiping Zhenjun" (Perfected Lord of Great Peace); in 442 the emperor personally went to the ritual altar to receive talismans and registers, after which it became customary for Northern Wei emperors to receive registers upon accession — Daoism became a state religion for the first time, known to history as the "Northern Celestial Masters," and Emperor Taiwu's suppression of Buddhism (446) in the same period is related to this development. In the south: Lu Xiujing, a Daoist priest of Mount Lu, organized the scriptures of the Three Caverns and in 471 presented the Catalogue of the Scriptures of the Three Caverns, recording 1,228 juan, laying the foundation for the "Three Caverns" classification of the Daoist Canon; he also reorganized the Celestial Masters institution and compiled over a hundred juan of zhai and jiao ritual codes, making him the founder of both the "Southern Celestial Masters" and Lingbao ritual protocol. In the Liang dynasty, Tao Hongjing retired to Mount Mao (Maoshan), where he compiled the Declarations of the Perfected (Zhengao) and the Concealed Instructions for Ascending to Perfection, organized the Shangqing scriptures and revelations, and established a hierarchy of immortals and deities (the Zhenling Weiye Tu, Chart of the Ranks and Functions of the Perfected and Divine), making the Shangqing (Maoshan) school the mainstream of southern Daoism; he was on close terms with Emperor Wu of Liang, was known as the "Prime Minister among the Mountains," and was also accomplished in medicine and alchemy. Emperor Wu of Northern Zhou sponsored the compilation of the Supreme Secret Essentials (Wushang biyao, c. 577), the earliest surviving Daoist encyclopedic compendium, and in 574 abolished both Buddhism and Daoism together before later establishing the Tongdao Guan. In addition, Louguan Daoism arose in the north centered on the Louguantai on Mount Zhongnan in the Guanzhong region, propagating the doctrine that "Laozi converted the barbarians" (Laozi hua hu) and engaging in extensive polemics with Buddhism (as in Gu Huan's Yixia Lun, Treatise on the Chinese and the Barbarians, 467). By the end of this period, Daoism already possessed a scriptural system, a pantheon of deities, precepts and ritual protocols, and official status, paving the way for its establishment as a state religion in the Sui and Tang.
The Sui and Tang were among the golden ages of Daoism. Both Emperor Wen and Emperor Yang of Sui treated Daoist priests with favor, and the reign title "Kaihuang" was itself taken from a Daoist scripture. The Tang imperial house bore the surname Li and honored Laozi as their "Sage Ancestor"; in 625 Emperor Gaozu of Tang fixed the order of precedence among the Three Teachings as Daoism first, Confucianism second, and Buddhism last. In 666 Emperor Gaozong of Tang bestowed on Laozi the title "Supreme Mysterious-Prime Emperor," and the reign of Emperor Xuanzong of Tang (712–756) marked the peak: he decreed that every household, gentry and commoner alike, keep a copy of the Daodejing, established the Chongxuan Academy and Daoist examinations, elevated the Laozi, Zhuangzi, Liezi, and Wenzi to the status of "true scriptures," personally wrote a commentary on the Daodejing, established Xuanyuan Emperor temples in the prefectures of the two capitals in 741, and in 748 conferred on Laozi the further honorific title "Great Sagely Ancestor, Emperor of the Golden Portal, Most High Mysterious-Prime Celestial Sovereign of the Great Dao"; he also ordered the compilation of the Phonetic and Semantic Glosses on All Daoist Scriptures (Yiqie daojing yinyi) and the first Daoist Canon, the Daoist Canon of the Kaiyuan Era (Kaiyuan Daozang; according to one account called the Sandong Qionggang, Jade Compendium of the Three Caverns, comprising some 3,744 juan). Although Wu Zetian favored Buddhism, she still bestowed on Laozi's mother the title "Empress Dowager of the Prior Heaven." In doctrine, Cheng Xuanying, Li Rong, Wang Xuanlan, and others interpreted the Laozi and Zhuangzi through the thought of Chongxuan (Twofold Mystery), absorbing Buddhist Madhyamaka thought to transcend being and non-being, and forming the Sui-Tang school of Twofold Mystery; Sima Chengzhen's Treatise on Sitting in Oblivion and Master of Heavenly Seclusion (Tianyinzi) established methods of cultivating mind and nature and of Sitting in Oblivion, while Wu Yun's Treatise on the Mysterious Guideline systematically expounded the substance of the Dao. In the Shangqing (Maoshan) school, Wang Yuanzhi, Pan Shizheng, Sima Chengzhen, and Li Hanguang served successively as teachers to the emperors, and the school remained the mainstream of the tradition; Sun Simiao compiled works on medicine and the nourishing of life, Ye Fashan and Luo Gongyuan were renowned for their ritual arts, and Zhang Guo and others were later numbered among the Eight Immortals. Waidan (External Alchemy) flourished as never before, and several emperors are suspected to have died from ingesting elixirs — a fact that prompted reflection and helped set the stage for the later turn toward Neidan (Internal Alchemy). At the end of the Tang, Du Guangting brought together the traditions of ritual protocol, immortal biography, and scriptural commentary, composing the Daode Zhenjing Guangshengyi (Expansive Sagely Meaning of the Perfect Scripture of the Dao and Its Virtue) and the Complete Collection of Daoist Ritual Protocols (Daomen kefan daquanji); he went to Shu to serve Wang Jian of Former Shu, and became a pivotal figure in the transformation of Daoism from Tang to Song. The Buddhist persecution of the Huichang era (845) was launched by the Daoism-favoring Emperor Wuzong of Tang, and Daoist influence swelled for a time. After the An Lushan Rebellion, state control weakened, and the legends of Zhongli Quan and Lü Dongbin, along with Neidan thought, began to take shape.
During the wars and upheavals of the Five Dynasties, Daoism continued to be honored under the various regional regimes (Du Guangting under the Former Shu, and under Southern Tang, Wuyue and Min, among others), and a pivotal figure emerged in Chen Tuan: living as a recluse on Mount Hua, he transmitted the Diagram of the Limitless (Wuji tu) and the Diagram of the Pre-celestial (Xiantian tu), fusing Yijing studies, internal alchemy and the study of mind and nature; from him descended, on one line, the Song Neo-Confucianism of Shao Yong and Zhou Dunyi, and on another, Zhang Boduan's Southern Lineage of internal alchemy. Tan Qiao's Book of Transformation (Huashu) and Lüqiu Fangyuan also belong to this period. After the founding of the Northern Song, the reigns of Emperor Zhenzong and Emperor Huizong brought successive high tides of imperial devotion to Daoism: in 1008 Zhenzong staged the descent of "Heavenly Texts," performed the feng and shan sacrifices at Mount Tai and offered sacrifice at Fenyin; in 1012 he honored the Sagely Ancestor Zhao Xuanlang; in 1014 he conferred on Laozi the title "Supreme Lord Lao, Emperor of Prime Virtue and Original Unity," and built the Yuqing Zhaoying Palace, ordering Wang Qinruo and others to compile the Baowen tonglu, which Zhang Junfang continued to completion as the 4,565-fascicle Precious Canon of the Celestial Palace of the Great Song (1019), distilling its essentials into the Seven Slips from the Bookbag of the Clouds. Huizong styled himself "Sovereign Ruler and Daoist Lord Emperor" (1117), favored Lin Lingsu and Wang Wenqing, and promoted the Thunder Rites of the Shenxiao school; he converted Buddhist temples to Daoist use (1119), established Daoist academic posts and Daoist officials, and compiled and printed the Wanshou Daoist Canon (around 1117–1119, 5,481 fascicles, the first woodblock-printed edition). The configuration of Daoist lineages was also being reorganized in this period: the Zhong–Lü internal-alchemy tradition became the mainstream theory of cultivation, and Zhang Boduan completed the Awakening to Reality (Wuzhen pian) in 1075, laying the foundation of the Southern Lineage of internal alchemy. In talismanic ritual Daoism, "new register traditions" characterized by thunder rites and summoning-and-interrogation rituals emerged, such as the Tianxin Zhengfa (Rao Dongtian, Tan Zixiao, late tenth to eleventh century) and the Shenxiao school (Lin Lingsu, Wang Wenqing); the lineage of the Zhang Celestial Masters at Mount Longhu regained court recognition after Zhenzong's reign (in 1015 Zhang Zhengsui was granted the title "Master"), and Maoshan, Mount Gezao and Mount Longhu gradually formed the configuration known as the "Three Mountains of Registers." Northern Song Daoism reached a further peak under the impetus of imperial power, and the situation changed abruptly after the Jingkang Incident (1127).
After the Jingkang Incident, China was divided into a northern and a southern regime, and Daoism developed along two distinct northern and southern paths. Under the rule of the Jin in the north, three new Daoist lineages emerged: Xiao Baozhen's Taiyi (Supreme Unity) teaching (around 1138, emphasizing talismans and loyalty and filial piety), Liu Deren's Zhen Dadao (True Great Way, 1142, emphasizing ascetic labor), and Wang Chongyang's Quanzhen Daoism (1167, emphasizing the dual cultivation of nature and life, the unity of the Three Teachings, and monastic renunciation of household life). Quanzhen was the most consequential of the three: in 1167 Wang Chongyang traveled to Ninghai in Shandong, where he received Ma Yu, Qiu Chuji, Tan Chuduan, Liu Chuxuan, Wang Chuyi, Hao Datong and Sun Bu'er as disciples — the "Seven Perfected" — and died at Bianliang in 1170. In 1219 Qiu Chuji was summoned by Genghis Khan, and in 1222 he had audience with the khan at his encampment in the Great Snow Mountains (the Hindu Kush), where he famously counseled him "to put an end to killing with a single word"; he returned to Yanjing in 1224, was given authority over Daoism throughout the empire, and secured exemption from taxes and corvée for the order. Under Mongol rule Quanzhen expanded rapidly to its height, and between 1237 and 1244 Song Defang directed the carving and printing of the more than 7,800-fascicle Precious Canon of the Mysterious Metropolis (Xuandu baozang). In the Buddhist–Daoist debates of 1255–1258 Quanzhen suffered defeat, and in 1281 Kublai Khan ordered the burning of all Daoist scriptures other than the Daodejing, a serious setback for the order; thereafter it merged with the Southern Lineage of internal alchemy in the south, forming a Quanzhen tradition that venerated the transmission from Zhongli Quan and Lü Dongbin through Wang Chongyang to the Seven Perfected. In the south: the Southern Song was dominated by the "Three Mountains of Registers" — Mount Longhu, Maoshan and Mount Gezao; Bai Yuchan integrated the Southern Lineage of internal alchemy with thunder rites; the Qingwei school (Huang Shunshen) and the Jingming (Pure and Bright) Daoism of Liu Yu (whose teaching was established around 1297) took shape in succession, while the Shenxiao and Tianxin traditions continued to be transmitted. In the Yuan, the Celestial Masters of Mount Longhu were favored: in 1276 Zhang Zongyan came to court to take charge of Daoism throughout the Jiangnan region, and his disciple Zhang Liusun remained at court to found the "Xuanjiao" (Mysterious Teaching), which was carried on by Wu Quanjie; in 1304 Emperor Chengzong granted the thirty-eighth-generation Celestial Master Zhang Yucai the title "Master of the Zhengyi Teaching, in charge of the Registers of the Three Mountains," bringing the various register traditions under Zhengyi and forming the twofold "Zhengyi–Quanzhen" configuration that persists to this day. The Yongle Palace (construction begun 1247) and the Corpus of Daoist Ritual (Daofa huiyuan) are likewise representative of the Daoist art and compendia of ritual method produced in this period.
Ming Daoism, under state administration, continued the twofold "Zhengyi–Quanzhen" configuration, with Zhengyi more heavily relied upon by the court for its expertise in liturgical retreats, offerings and talismanic registers. In 1368 the founding emperor Zhu Yuanzhang summoned the forty-second-generation Celestial Master Zhang Zhengchang; in 1370 he abolished the title "Celestial Master" and conferred instead the title "Perfected of the Zhengyi Transmission"; in 1382 he established the Daoist Registry to administer Daoism nationwide, divided Daoist priests into the two categories "Zhengyi" and "Quanzhen," instituted a system of ordination certificates, and restricted the private construction of temples among the populace. The Yongle Emperor Zhu Di venerated Zhenwu, and from 1412 undertook a great building program on the Wudang Mountains, completing over more than a decade a complex of nine palaces, eight temples and thirty-three structures; in 1406 he ordered the forty-third-generation Celestial Master Zhang Yuchu to compile the Daoist Canon, and Zhang Yuchu wrote the Ten Rules for the Daoist Community to reform monastic discipline. The compilation of the Canon, directed in succession by Zhang Yuchu, Zhang Yuqing and Shao Yizheng, was completed in the ninth to tenth years of the Zhengtong reign (1444–1445) as the 5,305-fascicle, 480-case Daoist Canon of the Zhengtong Era; in 1607 the fiftieth-generation Celestial Master Zhang Guoxiang, by imperial commission, compiled a continuation, the 180-fascicle Supplementary Daoist Canon of the Wanli Era, bringing the total to 5,485 fascicles — the only complete premodern Daoist Canon to survive today. Under the Jiajing reign of Emperor Shizong (1522–1566), imperial devotion to Daoism reached its peak: Shao Yuanjie and Tao Zhongwen rose to the highest offices of state through their skill in liturgical retreats and the arts of the immortals, and figures such as the "Green Text Chancellor" Yan Song emerged in this climate. As for the Quanzhen school, though its political standing fell short of Zhengyi's, the Longmen lineage continued to be transmitted among the populace, and legends of Zhang Sanfeng at Wudang flourished — the Yongle Emperor's repeated dispatch of envoys to seek him out, without success, only heightened his fame; Zhang Sanfeng, Lu Xixing (of the Eastern Lineage of internal alchemy) and Wu Shouyang (source of the Wu-Liu School) helped spread internal alchemy among literati and commoners alike. In the same period, Lin Zhao'en founded the Sanyi (Three-in-One) Teaching; morality books such as the Treatise of the Most High on Action and Response and the Tract on Hidden Merit of Lord Wenchang circulated widely; the cults of the City God, Guandi, Zhenwu, Mazu and others expanded through the combined promotion of officialdom and the populace, and novels such as Journey to the West and Investiture of the Gods reflected the secularization of the Daoist pantheon. In the late Ming, state control loosened; although the hereditary succession of the Zhengyi Celestial Masters continued, Daoism as a whole was already showing signs of decline.
The Qing dynasty made Tibetan Buddhism its state religion, and its attitude toward Daoism grew cool and controlling. The Shunzhi reign and the early Kangxi reign still treated the Celestial Masters with ceremony: in 1651 the fifty-second-generation Zhang Yingjing was granted the title "Great Perfected of the Zhengyi Transmission." The Yongzheng Emperor for a time placed his trust in Lou Jinyuan of Mount Longhu and commissioned the building of the Daguangming Hall in the capital; but the Qianlong Emperor lowered the Celestial Master's official rank to the fifth grade in 1752 (some sources say 1742) and forbade him to attend court audiences, and in 1821 the Daoguang Emperor ended court audiences for the Celestial Master altogether — the standing of Zhengyi at the official level declined continuously. Against this, a "revival" occurred within the Quanzhen Longmen lineage: in the thirteenth year of the Shunzhi reign (1656), Wang Changyue, by imperial command, opened an ordination platform at the White Cloud Temple in Beijing and conducted the transmission of precepts three times, ordaining more than a thousand disciples and receiving the purple robe; he subsequently traveled south to transmit the precepts at Nanjing, Hangzhou, Huzhou, Wudang and elsewhere, established the ritual forms of the Three Altars of Great Precepts (Initial Perfection, Medium Ultimate, and Celestial Immortality), and wrote the Heart Methods of the Dragon Gate Lineage; his lineage of disciples spread throughout the north and south, and the White Cloud Temple was established as the foremost public monastery of Quanzhen. From the Qianlong and Jiaqing reigns onward, figures such as Min Yide (of Mount Jingai, compiler of the Storehouse of the Hermit's Tower of Ancient Books, who combined his teaching with the Xizhu Xinzong lineage), Liu Yiming (of Mount Qiyun, author of the Twelve Daoist Books), Liu Huayang (author of the Scripture of Wisdom and Life, 1794, paired with Wu Shouyang as the Wu-Liu School), Li Xiyue (of the Western Lineage, 1806–1856) and Huang Yuanji (author of the Recorded Sayings from the Hall of Joyful Cultivation) sustained the development of internal-alchemy studies among the populace and the literati. Jiang Yupu compiled the Essentials of the Daoist Canon (during the Jiaqing reign), which was reprinted by the Erxian Nunnery in Chengdu in 1906; Chen Minggui's Origins and Development of Changchun Daoism (1879) opened the way for the modern study of Daoist history. At the popular level, spirit writing, the cult of Patriarch Lü, Guandi and Wenchang, and morality books flourished greatly, and Daoism became deeply intertwined with local society, secret societies and popular sects. The Taiping Rebellion (1851–1864) destroyed temples on a massive scale, and the White Cloud Temple was affected by the Boxer Uprising (1900). The late-Qing New Policies campaign of "converting temple property to schools" (from 1898, and again after 1904) struck Daoist temples hard; both Zhengyi and Quanzhen fell into difficulty, sowing the conditions that would drive the organizational efforts of Republican-era Daoism.
The 1911 Revolution abolished the hereditary title of Celestial Master, and Daoism lost the institutional support it had enjoyed under the imperial system; it struggled to survive amid the "anti-superstition" movement, the conversion of temple property to schools, and civil war, while at the same time beginning to organize itself along the lines of modern religious associations. In 1912 the White Cloud Temple in Beijing (Quanzhen) established the "Central Daoist Association," and Shanghai (Zhengyi, led by the sixty-second-generation Celestial Master Zhang Yuanxu) established the "National Taoist Association of the Republic of China"; thereafter local Daoist associations rose and fell in various places. In 1928 the Nanjing Nationalist government promulgated the Standards for the Retention and Abolition of Shrines, and in 1929 the Regulations on the Supervision of Temples, under which large numbers of Daoist temples were occupied and converted to other uses. Important advances occurred in scholarship and publishing: between 1923 and 1926 the Hanfen Lou of the Commercial Press in Shanghai photolithographically reprinted the Daoist Canon of the Zhengtong Era (together with its supplement) from the copy held at the White Cloud Temple in Beijing, bringing the Canon into scholarly circulation for the first time; Chen Yingning read through the entire Canon at the White Cloud Temple between 1912 and 1914, founded the Yangshan Semi-Monthly in 1933 and the Immortality Studies Monthly in 1939, and advocated the study of "Immortality Studies" (Xianxue) as independent of religion and pursued with a scientific approach to internal alchemy, giving rise to the modern current of Immortality Studies; Chen Guofu published his Studies on the Origins and Development of the Daoist Canon in 1949, laying the foundations of Daoist-canon bibliography; Xu Dishan's History of Daoism (1934) and Fu Qinjia's History of Chinese Daoism (1937) were the earliest general histories of the tradition, and the Daoist studies of Henri Maspero of France were also undertaken in this period. During the War of Resistance against Japan, Daoists took part in relief and resistance activities, and sites such as the White Cloud Temple, Mount Qingcheng and Mount Longhu still maintained the transmission of precepts and the conferral of registers; a Shanghai Municipal Daoist Association was formed in 1936, and a further Shanghai Daoist Association in 1947, while in 1946 the sixty-third-generation Celestial Master Zhang Enpu organized a Chinese Taoist Association in Shanghai. At the popular level, spirit-writing altars and Daoist cloisters, along with charitable bodies such as the World Red Swastika Society (1921), flourished. In 1949 Zhang Enpu relocated to Taiwan, and the transmission of Zhengyi Daoism split between the mainland and Taiwan.
After the founding of the People's Republic of China, Daoism underwent reorganization amid land reform and shifting religious policy: temple lands were confiscated or reduced, Daoist priests were assigned to labor, and some returned to lay life. The Chinese Taoist Association was founded at the White Cloud Temple in Beijing in April 1957, with Yue Chongdai as its first president and Chen Yingning as vice-president (he became president of the second term in 1961); the Association published the Journal of the Chinese Taoist Association, held training courses for Daoist clergy (1962), and organized research into Daoist history. In 1966 the Cultural Revolution broke out, religious activity ceased entirely, temples were occupied and images and scriptures destroyed on a massive scale, and Daoist priests were dispersed; Chen Yingning died in Beijing in 1969, and Daoism suffered the most severe destruction it had experienced in the modern era. After 1978, religious policy was restored: the Chinese Taoist Association held its third National Congress in May 1980 to resume its work, with Li Yuhang as president; in 1982 Document No. 19 of the Central Committee of the Communist Party established the policy of freedom of religious belief, and key temples such as the White Cloud Temple, Mount Qingcheng, the Wudang Mountains, Mount Longhu, Maoshan, Mount Lao and Louguantai were restored and reopened in succession. In 1989 the White Cloud Temple held the first Quanzhen ordination since 1949; the China Taoist College was established in 1990; in 1991 Mount Longhu resumed the conferral of Zhengyi registers (initially for Daoists overseas, and for those within China from 1995); Fu Yuantian became president in 1992 and Min Zhiting in 1998; and in 1994 the ancient architectural complex of the Wudang Mountains was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. In scholarship, Wang Ming's Collated Edition of the Scripture of Great Peace (1960) and the two separately edited histories, History of Chinese Daoism (ed. Qing Xitai, 1988–1995) and History of Chinese Daoism (ed. Ren Jiyu, 1990), laid the foundations of contemporary scholarship. Between 1980 and 2000, Daoism completed its transformation from ruin to revival across institutions, education, temples and scholarship.
Entering the twenty-first century, Daoism on the Chinese mainland has continued to develop under institutionalized management. The Chinese Taoist Association has been led in succession by Ren Farong (2005–2015) and Li Guangfu (2015– ) as president; in 2004 the Zhonghua Daozang (Chinese Daoist Canon, 49 volumes, Huaxia Publishing House) was published, the first systematic compilation, punctuation and re-editing of the Daoist Canon since the Zhengtong Daozang; in 2007 an International Daodejing Forum was held in Xi'an and Hong Kong, and from 2011 an International Forum on Daoism has been held (Mount Heng in 2011, Mount Longhu in 2014, Wudang Mountains in 2017, Maoshan in 2023), with Daoist activities at famous mountains running alongside the tourism and cultural industry. Ordination and register conferral have become institutionalized: Quanzhen ordination ceremonies have been successively held at Mount Qingcheng (1995), Mount Qian (2002), Mount Lao (2016) and Nanyue (2019), and Zhengyi conferral of registers has become a regular event at Mount Longhu; Daoist colleges have been established in various places; the newly revised Regulations on Religious Affairs took effect in 2018, and a religious affairs white paper of the same year reported more than 9,000 Daoist temples and more than 40,000 clergy nationwide. In scholarship, The Taoist Canon (2004), the History of Chinese Daoist Thought (2009), the journal Daojiao Yanjiu Xuebao (Studies in Daoism, 2009) and the Journal of Daoist Studies (2008) have been published, and Sichuan University, the Chinese University of Hong Kong, the École française d'Extrême-Orient and others have become centers of research. At the same time, Daoism faces problems of personnel, commercialization, temple management and the boundary with popular religion; "Dao culture" — life-nourishment, taijiquan, internal alchemy, fengshui and the like — has become widely popular at the level of the general public.
The transmission of Daoism beyond China's borders has a long but uneven history. In East Asia: Tang-dynasty Daoism influenced the Korean peninsula (Goguryeo sent an envoy to the Tang in 624 to seek Daoist methods, and the Tang sent Daoist priests to Goguryeo to lecture on the Laozi) and Japan (no religious organization was formed there, but Onmyōdō, Shugendō and the Kōshin cult all contain elements of Daoism), while Vietnam has long preserved Daoist liturgy along with the cults of the City God, Guandi and Zhenwu. In the modern era the principal channel has been Chinese emigration: immigrants from Fujian and Guangdong carried Zhengyi, Lüshan, Pu'an and other ritual traditions, together with the cults of Mazu, Guandi and Tua Pek Kong, to Taiwan and Southeast Asia; in Taiwan, the Ming and Qing saw the formation of a tradition centered on married, home-dwelling Zhengyi Daoist priests (huoju daoshi), and in 1949 the sixty-third-generation Celestial Master Zhang Enpu relocated to Taiwan, after which the Taiwan Provincial Taoist Association and the Taoism Society of the Republic of China (around 1966) were established; Taiwan became an important field site for the study of Daoist liturgy (Kristofer Schipper received ordination in Tainan in the 1960s). In Hong Kong, from the early twentieth century Cantonese Quanzhen Daoist halls relocated southward, and Sik Sik Yuen (1921), Fung Ying Seen Koon (1929), Ching Chung Koon and the Yuen Yuen Institute (1950) and others rose to prominence; the Hong Kong Taoist Association was founded in 1961. Macau has a Taoist Association (2001) and the liturgical tradition of the Wu Qingyun Daoist Cloister. In Southeast Asia, the Taoist Federation (Singapore) (1990) and the Federation of Taoist Associations Malaysia and others were founded in the 1990s. In Europe and America, the principal forms of transmission have been translations of the Daodejing (more than a hundred since 1868), taijiquan, qigong, internal alchemy and "philosophical Daoism"; the first International Conference on Daoist Studies at Bellagio in 1968 opened up Daoist studies in the West, the École française d'Extrême-Orient and others became centers of research, and Kohn's Daoism Handbook (2000) and Pregadio's The Encyclopedia of Taoism (2008) were published in succession; from the 1970s, temples and religious communities led by both Chinese and Western practitioners appeared in North America. Overseas Daoism as a whole presents a pattern of two parallel strands: "liturgy and popular religion" on the one hand, and "philosophy and life-nourishment" on the other.