Li Hongzhang entered Jiaguan Dihua Bookstore to study at the age of six. He was a smart young man. He studied classics and history under his uncle Li Fangxian and Xu Ziling, a famous scholar in Hefei, and laid a solid foundation of knowledge.
In the 23rd year of Daoguang's reign (1843), Li Hongzhang was selected as an outstanding tribute in Luzhou Prefecture. His father, who was a Beijing official at the time, hoped that his son would achieve success, so he sent a letter to urge Hongzhang to come to Beijing to prepare for the provincial examination in Shuntian Prefecture next year. Hongzhang obeyed his father's orders, resolutely went north, and wrote 10 poems "Enter the Capital" to express his thoughts. One of them says: The husband holds the Wu hook with only one hand, and his spirit is higher than that of a hundred-foot building. Whoever writes history in the past ten thousand years wants to be named a marquis from three thousand miles away. I am sure that I will be able to follow the road quickly, how can I have the leisure to chase the water gulls? Pointing to the moon beside Lugou Bridge in the distance, how many people will come to Yingzhou from now on?
In the twenty-fourth year of Daoguang (1844), he failed the first scientific examination and lived in Zeng Guofan's residence in Beijing to receive tutoring from Zeng; in the twenty-seventh year of Daoguang (1847), the 24-year-old Li Hongzhang He passed the imperial examination and was elected to the Hanlin Academy as a scholar. At the same time, he studied under Zeng Guofan and focused on the study of world affairs. Three years later, the Hanlin Academy disbanded, and he was retained as editor of the Hanlin Academy.