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As the climate system is known to be warming unevenly, the open question of whether there has been a significant warming hiatus at global or regional scales has attracted worldwide attention. With annual mean air temperature (T-mean) setting new records subsequent to 2012, it is reasonable to reanalyse the presence of an apparent decelerated warming trend in China. We therefore examined the shifts of temperature trends in China between 1980 and 2017 using homogenized records from 798 meteorological stations via the Breaks For Additive Season and Trend (BFAST) method and Mann-Kendall and Sen's slope estimator statistical tests. The results show that T-mean at the country level exhibited monotonic increase with a positive break occurring around 1997, and the warming rate during 1980-2017 (0.36 degrees C/decade) was slightly higher than that during 1980-1997, which suggests that this positive break did not overwhelm the overall continuous warming trend. Spatial records show that most areas west of 108 degrees E or south of 30 degrees N within the country experienced a continual warming trend over the study period and that negative break that occurred around 2010 was major contributor to temporary decelerated warming trend detected in other areas, especially in Northeast China. Hence, this study highlights annual air temperature has continued to rise overall in China since 1980, while considerable regional differences have been detected within the shifts of temperature trends.