China's Year of the Horse Spring Festival holiday, featuring a record-long nine days, concluded on Monday, unleashing a powerful surge in tourism and consumer spending.

During the holiday, more than 2.8 billion cross-regional trips were made, setting a new historical high for travel volume.

 

The 2026 Spring Festival travel rush, known as chunyun and often described as the world's largest human migration, is expected to generate a record 9.5 billion inter-regional passenger trips during the 40-day period running from Feb. 2 to March 13. As of Saturday, the travel rush had passed its halfway mark, with 5.08 billion inter-regional trips completed in the first 20 days.

 

Meanwhile, inbound tourism saw remarkable growth. Amid rising social media trends such as “becoming Chinese,” traveling to China for the Spring Festival has become increasingly popular among international visitors. This momentum has been supported by the expansion of visa-free policies, improved tax refund measures, and upgraded inbound tourism services.

During the holiday, foreign tourists to China have doubled and inbound flight bookings have more than quintupled year-on-year. According to the National Immigration Administration, international visitors made 1.313 million cross-border trips during the holiday, with the daily average increasing by 21.8 percent year on year. Among them, 460,000 travelers entered under visa-free policies, up 28.5 percent from last year’s daily average.

 

Domestic consumption was equally vibrant, with regions across China leveraging local cultural resources to create new consumption scenarios.

In Chengdu, the Chunxi Road commercial district reported booming business at several newly opened cultural and creative stores. Products inspired by the giant panda proved especially popular. Traditional crafts such as Shu embroidery and lacquerware were also widely incorporated into this year’s cultural merchandise.

 

Service consumption further reinforced the upward trend. China's box office revenue during the nine-day holiday totaled 5.75 billion yuan ($828.65 million), with total admissions hitting 120 million.

During the first Spring Festival holiday since the launch of island-wide special customs operations in China's Hainan Free Trade Port (FTP), the southern tropical island has become a popular destination for tourists. Sanya's four offshore duty-free stores recorded 242 million yuan in single-day sales, representing a year-on-year increase of 214.5 percent.

 

Technology also reshaped consumption patterns during the holiday. AI-generated travel orders increased by more than 800 percent compared with pre-holiday levels. A reporter from the Beijing Business Today learned from JD.com that during the Spring Festival holiday, visits to robot-related product pages increased more than fourfold year on year, while searches for “robots” surged 25 times. Sales of AI-related products doubled compared with the same period last year, with smartphones, laptops, toys, and smart glasses drawing particular attention.

Overall, the Spring Festival holiday not only demonstrated the strong vitality of China’s consumer market, but also highlighted the growing role of cultural creativity, inbound tourism, and technological innovation in driving high-quality economic growth.