The report shows: China’s tourism market is booming and the “traffic conversion” question remains to be solved

China News Service, Hefei, November 11 (Reporter Zhang Qiang) The World Tourism Alliance and other organizations jointly released three tourism reports in Hefei on the 11th, outlining the basic outline of the current Chinese tourism market: passenger flow remains high, but "popularity" has not yet been fully converted into "wealth." How to convert tourism flow into revenue has become a core question that the industry must face.

On the same day, at the "2026 World Tourism Alliance Xianghu Dialogue" event held in Hefei, the "China Inbound and Outbound Tourism Market Sentiment Report in the Second Half of 2026", "China Domestic Tourism Market Scenery Report in the Second Half of 2026" and "2025-2026 Cross-Border Tourism Consumption Trend Research Report" were officially released.

The "China Inbound and Outbound Tourism Market Sentiment Report for the Second Half of 2026" shows that in the second half of 2026, the comprehensive prosperity index of China's inbound and outbound tourism markets has improved compared with the first half of the year.

In terms of the inbound tourism market, foreign tourists are expected to visit China positively, and market confidence and destination value indexes are both in a high-prosperity range; cultural experiences, specialty food, and city strolling experiences have received widespread attention, and tourists are willing to increase their spending on performing arts projects, cultural and creative products, and specialty catering. In the outbound tourism market, platform and corporate bookings have generally increased year-on-year, but there are differences in the growth pace of different route products.

The above-mentioned report also shows that in the second half of 2026, the travel demand of Chinese domestic residents will still be resilient. The booking indicators of some platforms and enterprises were slightly lower than the same period last year, but there were signs of improvement in September. It is expected that the market will see a partial recovery in the future, driven by holiday and seasonal demand.

The "2025-2026 Cross-Border Tourism Consumption Trend Research Report" points out that China continues to expand the coverage of the visa-free policy and implements a series of convenient measures such as optimizing payment, which effectively drives the growth of inbound passenger flow; the flow of inbound tourism is gradually extending from traditional gateway cities to featured destinations.

Zhang Xu, Chairman of the World Tourism Alliance, believes that experiential consumption has become the growth engine of global tourism. Digital technologies such as AI and big data are accelerating the reshaping of the tourism industry ecology. Emerging and niche destinations are showing rapid growth, and the boundaries of the tourism industry continue to expand.