This study adopts a critical phenomenological approach to explore the impacts of COVID-19 on the transnational educational experiences of Chinese college students in short-term academic exchange programmes hosted by universities in the United States. This study uses concepts of cosmopolitan capital and ambiguous loss to interpret the pandemic experiences of Chinese students. Accordingly, the current study promotes scholarly conversation about the meanings of global student mobility in the time of COVID-19, especially international exchange students who have missed learning opportunities in their academic, social, and cultural lives and have lacked social and emotional supports. Overall, this study expands the growing body of evidence on the impacts of COVID-19 on global student mobility and provides critical insights into the nexus between cosmopolitan elite positions and structural problems of the cosmopolitan social hierarchy within the specific cross-national context of higher education between the U.S. and China.