A tidal wave of romance — and marriage registrations — swept the nation on Friday, as couples couldn't resist the phonetics of love.

Spoken in Chinese, Friday's date, Jan 3, 2014, expressed as 1413, sounds like "love you for a lifetime" (yi sheng yi shi).

It not only added extra significance to tying the knot but caused a rush to marriage registration offices.

As of 4 am on Friday, 309 couples had registered marriages in Beijing's Haidian district.

"Usually, the number is about 100 to 200," said Chen Ru, director of the marriage registration office.

Shanghai's Yangpu district saw a similar pattern an hour and a half before closing time.

"There were more than 60 couples coming to us to tie the knot by 3 pm," Wang Haiyan, director of Yangpu district's marriage office said on Friday.

The normal daily registration number ranges from 20 to 30, Wang said.

Gao Bin, 30, and Dai Wanwei, 26, made an appointment to register a month ago.

"We missed 1314 (Jan 4, 2013) because we were not together yet, but we don't want to miss 1413," Gao said. "It's a special day and we choose to register on the day for luck."