Children wearing traditional Chinese costumes enjoy leisure time in an ancient town in Xuchang, central China's Henan Province, May 1, 2025. (Photo by Niu Shupei/Xinhua)
Millions of Chinese travelers spent billions during their May Day holiday trips, offering a snapshot of resilient consumer confidence and the vitality of the world's second-largest economy.
Chinese tourists made 314 million domestic trips and spent 180.3 billion yuan (roughly 25 billion U.S. dollars) from May 1 to 5, marking 6.4 percent and 8 percent year-on-year rises respectively, according to official figures.
As one of the busiest travel periods on the calendar, the holiday saw millions of Chinese people hit the road to visit family, explore domestic destinations or travel abroad. The surge in travel provided a boost to the transportation, tourism and retail sectors.
Tourism insiders hailed this May Day holiday the most vibrant in the past few years by different indications, pointing to strong data and robust market response.
In the past five days, highways were jammed, train tickets sold out within minutes, and major tourist destinations overflowed with visitors.
As the night fell, the energy remained high. In Guangxi, local governments hosted nighttime carnivals, dazzling light shows, and open-air concerts to revitalize the nightlife scene and encourage people to stay out longer and spend more.
Nationally recognized nighttime cultural and tourism zones registered nearly 76 million visits during the holiday, up 5.2 percent from a year ago, according to figures released by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism.
This push to diversify the holiday experience wasn't limited to nighttime attractions. Across the country, local governments and tourism operators embraced technology to enhance convenience and comfort for the millions of travelers on the move.
In the city of Suzhou, Jiangsu Province, an AI-powered peak-avoidance system helped visitors plan their routes more efficiently by analyzing real-time traffic and crowd data across the city's major attractions.
In Sichuan's Qingcheng Mountain scenic area, visitors encountered robotic exoskeletons designed to make trekking easier, along with drone delivery services that transported snacks and supplies to the mountains.
The surge in travel extended beyond China's borders. According to official data, China saw nearly 10.9 million inbound and outbound trips by Chinese and foreign nationals during the five-day break, an average of 2.18 million per day, up 28.7 percent from the same period last year.
The steady rebound in inbound tourism was fueled by growing interest from countries including Myanmar, the Republic of Korea, Malaysia, Australia and the United Kingdom.
China's visa-free policies also played a role. A total of 380,000 foreigners entered China under such arrangements during the holiday, a year-on-year increase of 72.7 percent.
To welcome more international travelers, China has expanded visa-free policies to allow longer stays and wider travel within the country with simplified visa procedures, and introduced new conveniences such as instant tax refunds for departing visitors.
Amid mounting global uncertainty, China has prioritized boosting consumption as a cornerstone of its economic growth. Policymakers at both the national and local levels have rolled out a series of targeted measures aimed at reviving household spending, with the service sector, which includes tourism, highlighted as a promising driver for this campaign.
Those efforts began bearing fruit. In the first quarter, China's total retail sales of consumer goods rose 4.6 percent year-on-year. Services consumption picked up pace as well, with service retail sales climbing 5 percent.
China's economy expanded by 5.4 percent in the first quarter compared to a year earlier, placing it among the fastest-growing major economies in the world.
