On the road again: packed overseas itinerary for globetrotting Chinese President Xi Jinping

President Xi Jinping will have spent at least 24 days abroad visiting eight countries in the last four months of the year.

He will leave Beijing on Saturday for the G20 Leaders' Summit in Turkey, just days after his trip to Vietnam and meeting Taiwanese leader Ma Ying-jeou in Singapore.

Hours after his return from the three-day visit to Antalya, Xi will head to the airport again on November 17 for a summit of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum in the Philippines, amid tensions over China's ongoing construction in the disputed South China Sea.

The president has been busy reaching out since his high-profile seven-day visit to the United States in late September. Last month, he brought investments worth billions of pounds to Britain and returned to Beijing just in time for the Communist Party plenum on October 26.

READ MORE: Full coverage of Xi's US trip

In the past weeks, Xi has shifted his attention from the major Western powers to neighbouring countries. And later this month, he will fly to France to address a climate change summit and to South Africa for the China-Africa Cooperation Summit early next month.

Professor Jin Canrong, a government foreign affairs adviser from Renmin University, said Xi's tight itinerary indicated that he faced tougher challenges abroad than at home.