A damaged house is seen in Pingyuan county, Dezhou city in China's eastern Shandong province, on Sunday. Agence France-Presse

The US Geological Survey (USGS) said the quake struck at 2:33 am (1833 GMT Saturday), 26 kilometres south of the city of Dezhou in Shandong province, at a depth of 10 kilometres.

It was the strongest to hit the province in more than a decade, state-run tabloid the Global Times said.

The quake was felt as far away as Beijing and Tianjin, as well as in Shanghai, about 800 kilometres from the epicentre.

Videos on social media showed shaking light fixtures, trembling ground and people evacuating their buildings, with one clip showing people walking past bricks scattered on the ground.

"The tremor was so strong... during the earthquake my head was shaking on the pillow, I thought I was having a nightmare," one person posted on social media platform Weibo from Shandong's neighbouring Hebei province.

USGS's PAGER system, which provides preliminary assessments on the impact of earthquakes, issued a red alert, estimating extensive damage and some casualties were probable based on previous quake data.

By Sunday evening, the quake had caused 23 injuries in Pingyuan County, Dezhou City, "of which 10 people were hospitalized for minor injuries, and 13 people were slightly injured," the city's official Wechat account said, citing Earthquake Field Command.

A media team saw cracked walls and bricks strewn on the ground near the epicentre of the quake in the rural and sparsely populated county but the damage appeared relatively minor.

Locals helped with the cleanup operation in one village, with a group of four elderly women putting a low brick wall back together outside an overgrown yard.

Agence France-Presse