China sees nearly 300m domestic tourist trips during May Day holiday

BEIJING -- China saw about 295 million domestic tourist trips during the five-day May Day holiday that ended Sunday, up 7.6 percent year on year and 28.2 percent from the same period in 2019, data from the Ministry of Culture and Tourism showed Monday.

Domestic tourist expenditure during the period totaled 166.89 billion yuan (about $23.51 billion), up 13.5 percent from the same period in 2019.

Culture and tourism were deeply intertwined during the holiday, with popular destinations such as the Palace Museum, Sanxingdui Museum, and Yinxu Museum attracting a large number of visitors.

The nighttime economy was also thriving, with monitored national-level nighttime cultural and tourism destinations recording nearly 72.58 million visitors, an increase of 6.9 percent year on year.

With the resumption of more air routes, the introduction of measures for facilitating passengers' entry, and the increase in the number of countries with visa exemption agreements, inbound and outbound tourism has been recovering rapidly, according to the ministry.

China saw nearly 1.78 million inbound tourist trips and 1.9 million outbound tourist trips made during the holiday.