Golden Week 2026: Chinese Outbound Travel

China celebrated its National Day from 1-7 October, following a three-day holiday for Mid-Autumn Festival from 25-27 September – many chose to take three days of annual leave between the two public holidays to create a “Super Golden Week”. We’ve rounded up all the information on Chinese outbound travel over the holiday period as of 12 October, and will continue to update this post as new reports and data are released.

National Immigration Authority
China’s National Immigration Authority recorded a total of 15.46 million border crossings during the seven-day National Day holiday from 1-7 October, a 6.7% year-on-year increase.

Mainland Chinese made 4.44 million outbound trips during this time, up by 9.3% from the same period in 2025. Although this is far below the 7 million outbound trips made during 2019’s National Day holiday, data from OTAs and Dragon Trail’s own survey shows that many outbound travelers (including more than half of Ctrip customers) this Golden Week actually departed before the 1st of October and therefore wouldn’t be included in this number.

Domestically, Chinese travelers made 826 million trips (daily average +6.3% year on year) and spent 738.4 billion RMB (daily average +4.3% year on year).

Tongcheng
OTA Tongcheng’s post-holiday report was released on 7 October. The most popular outbound destinations were South Korea, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Vietnam, Singapore, USA, Italy, Spain, and Australia. Traveler numbers doubled year on year to Iceland, Switzerland, and France. Group and small group tours were the most popular travel products sold by Tongcheng for the holiday period.

Fliggy
According to Fliggy’s post-holiday report, released on 7 October, the top outbound travel destinations for the National Day holiday were South Korea, Thailand, Malaysia, Vietnam, France, and Australia.

GZL
Chinese travel agency GZL travel reported a +300% annual increase in travel to long-haul visa-free outbound destinations this Golden Week, with +62% growth in bookings for tours of 10 days or more, and double the number of private family groups.

Tuniu
OTA Tuniu released its post-holiday report on 7 October. The most popular outbound destinations were South Korea, Indonesia, the Maldives, Italy, France, Switzerland, Türkiye, Thailand, Germany, and Malaysia.

Bookings for Canada, South Korea, and the Netherlands all more than doubled compared to 2025. Bookings for Türkiye and Morocco were up by more than 50% year on year, with trips to Ireland, USA, New Zealand, Belgium, and Egypt all up by more than 30%.

Travelers aged 30-39 accounted for more than 45% of bookings for short-haul tours on Tuniu, including popular tours to South Korea, Singapore, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, and Indonesia. Meanwhile, older travelers aged 50 and up made up close to 40% of those traveling long-haul. The best-selling long-haul tours included 10 days in Türkiye, 12 days in New Zealand, 13 days in Georgia, Azerbaijan, and Armenia, 13 days in Spain and Portugal, and 13 days in France, Switzerland, and Italy.