In most countries, there tends to be a large gap between urban and rural education outcomes. This column examines the impact of a 2004 Chinese education reform that connected high-quality teachers in urban areas with more than 100 million students in rural primary and middle schools through the use of satellite internet. Exposure to the reform in middle school significantly increased students’ academic achievement and their labour outcomes in the long run, suggesting that technology can be an effective way to close the rural–urban gap in education.