Chikan (Chinese: 赤坎; pinyin: Chìkǎn; Jyutping: cek3 ham2; Taishanese: cok4 ham1) is a town in Kaiping (開平), Jiangmen, Guangdong Province, China. It is officially designated as a National Historic and Cultural Town of China (中国历史文化名镇). Historically it was a regional maritime hub, center for emigration, emigrant market town, and the administrative centre of Kaiping.

Chikan town was founded in the year 1649 and was originally part of Xinhui County. Due to it being surrounded by the Tan River on all sides, it thrived in waterway transport. According to the 1991 town chronicle, a pier was present by the year 1676. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Chikan became the major regional maritime transportation hub in Kaiping county and, through its numerous ferries via the Tan river (潭江) to Jiangmen, in the Pearl River Delta. This came to an end upon the silting of the Tan River in the 20th century.

As a riverport, Chikan became a center for emigration from the Tan river catchment area in the late 19th century, pushed by increasing population pressure, rural poverty and civil disorder, and pulled by opportunities elsewhere and overseas. In the early 20th century, Chikan grew rapidly from a rural market for nearby villages of two competing clans, the Guan (关族) and the Situ (司徒族), to an emigrant market town for all comers. In 1907 the Chikan Chamber of Commerce was founded jointly by a Guan and a Situ. The rapid growth of Chikan was fueled by (a) local merchants prospering from trade along the Tan, (b) emigrants investing in the local shops, in modern roads to supplant the Tan River trade route, and in new local schools, and (c) young locals graduating from modern schools. In addition to investing, emigrants started to return when civil order began to improve. Thus, by the 1930s, Chikan became one of the largest market towns in South China with about 1,000 shops, the vast majority of them operated by emigrants or their families.

Chikan is located on the Tan River (潭江) near the geographical center of Kaiping, about 12 kilometres southwest of Kaiping city center. Chikan is located between the Li Garden (立园) and the Majianglong diaolous (马降龙雕楼群). Main roads that run through the town include Dixi Lu (堤西路)(sometimes referred to as 'European Styled Street') and Didong Lu (堤东路) on either sides of the Tan river, Er Malu (二马路) and Zhonghua Lu (中华路). There are 19 villages within Chikan as of 2013.

There are over 600 late-Qing and early-Republic historic Tong laus or Qilous (唐樓/ 騎樓) spanning over a length of 3 kilometers in the old town of Chikan. In the late 19th and early 20th century, Chikan was a regional market town, a center for emigration abroad, and a melting pot of ideas and trends brought back by overseas Chinese, "Huaqiao" (華僑). As a consequence, many qilou built during that period in Chikan incorporated architectural features from China and the West and were examples of the Qiaoxiang (僑鄉) architecture.

As a result of the concentration of historical buildings in Chikan, part of the old town was made into Chikan Studio City (赤坎影视城) in 2005, for filming of historical scenes. Movies least partially filmed in Chikan Studio City include The Grandmaster and Drunken Master II.

Jinghui Lou (Chinese: 景辉楼; Jyutping: ging2 fai1 lau4) is a Qilou on Dixi Road and was the former residence of Zhang Jinghui, a noted clinic in the early 20th century. Now converted into a museum.

There are about 200 diaolous still standing in Chikan township, most built during the early 20th century chaos, and most abandoned and in need of restoration. The oldest extant diaolou in Kaiping is found in northeast Chikan township, and one restored diaolou is located right in Chikan town.