Chinese porcelain Main article: Chinese ceramics
A Chinese porcelain-ware displaying battles between dragons, Kangxi era (1662-1722), Qing Dynasty. Porcelain is generally believed to have originated in China. Although proto-porcelain wares exist dating from the Shang Dynasty about 1600 BCE, by the Eastern Han Dynasty (100-200 CE) high firing glazed ceramic wares had developed into porcelain, and porcelain manufactured during the Tang Dynasty period (618–906) was exported to the Islamic world where it was highly prized.[4] Early porcelain of this type includes the tri-color glazed porcelain, or sancai wares. Historian S.A.M. Adshead writes that true porcelain items in the restrictive sense that we know them today could be found in dynasties after the Tang,[5] during the Song, Yuan, Ming, and Qing Dynasties.

By the Sui ( about 580 AD ) and Tang ( about 620 AD ) dynasties, porcelain had become widely produced. Eventually, porcelain and the expertise required to create it began to spread into other areas; by the seventeenth century, it was being exported to Europe.

Korean and Japanese porcelain also have long histories and distinct artistic traditions.