According to the latest data from International Diabetes Federation, China has the largest number of adults with diabetes, with ~140.9 million people having the disease.¹ Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) is one of the earliest complementary and alternative medicines worldwide to explore the prevention and treatment of diabetes.² Nowadays, TCM is being increasingly utilized as adjuvant therapy for the treatment of diabetes. However, there is a lack of TCM clinical guidelines for diabetes in primary health care, which can provide standardized suggestions to physicians. Fortunately, with the support of the State Administration of Traditional Chinese Medicine, a guideline titled National Chinese medicine guideline for the prevention and treatment of diabetes in primary care has been developed. The guideline working group systematically reviewed the clinical research evidence related to diabetes and assessed the overall quality of available evidence using the Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development, and Evaluations (GRADE) approach. Finally, the guideline was published in Chinese in December 2022.³ In order to enhance readers' understanding of this guideline and offer internationally representative insights on the use of TCM for diabetes in primary care, we have conducted a comprehensive commentary from the perspective of the working group.