On 18 October, the National Immigration Administration of China held a press conference, releasing data about immigration and international China travel during the third quarter of the year.
During Q3 2024, there had been over 160 million entries into Mainland China, growing an impressive 31.1% year-on-year (YoY). Among these entries, 8.19 million were foreign nationals, growing 48.8% YoY. More importantly, out of the foreign nationals, there were 4.89 million entries made by utilising the visa waiver for certain foreign nations. On China’s Twitter-like platform Weibo, the topic “Visa-free foreign visitors surge 78.6% YoY in Q3” shot to number 3 on the Hot Search list with 14.46 million views.
China has been trying to boost inbound travel since last year by announcing visa waivers for many countries. There were reciprocal waivers with countries such as Thailand, Malaysia and Singapore, as well as unilateral waivers for some other countries such as France, Germany and Italy. On 8 October, at the end of the National Day holiday, the Foreign Ministry confirmed that there are 24 countries in total that have reciprocal visa waivers in place with China. In late September, Denmark, Portugal, Greece, Cyprus and Slovenia were also added to the unilateral waivers list.
It seems these waivers have benefitted inbound travel greatly. For example, the Mohan crossing between China and Laos in Yunnan has seen a surge in Thai nationals entering in the last 6 months since the mutual waiver was put in place. Thai travellers now make up 54% of all entries and 74% of foreign visitors. On the other hand, Chinese netizens seem to be looking forward to foreign consumers contributing to the spending in China, but are also wary that international travellers might bring up the prices of things. However, stocks of online travel agencies (OTAs) are being watched closely.
