The “Chunyun” (春运, lit. Spring Transportation) is often called the largest annual human migration in the world. It is customary for Chinese people to return to their hometown or where their families live for the Spring Festival during the Chinese New Year (CNY) celebrations, similar to Christmas time in the West. Each year, hundreds of millions of people travel by air, train or road for festivities or leisure.
This weekend will be the last weekend before the Year of the Snake begins on 29 January, and much of the data is available to see how the “Chunyun” is going for 2025, the third Chinese New Year after Covid restrictions were lifted. On 23 January, China Railway unveiled that it had served over 100 million passengers. The next day, the group announced that it was forecasted to carry 14.2 million on the day and it had sold 297 million train tickets for travel during the Spring Festival period.
Authorities estimated that across China, over the entire festive period, there will be over 256 million travellers. On 22 January, 233.86 million journeys were made across the country, up 14.9% from 2024 levels in the same period. However, it needs to be taken into consideration that there was a serious snowstorm last year right before the New Year that affected a large swathe of China.
It has been forecasted that the 40-day “Chunyun” period would see a record-breaking 9 billion journeys made, with 80% of them by car. Anecdotally, this year saw many trying to get ahead of the travel rush by taking their trips earlier and by car. This caused heavy traffic across express highways in China. With local tourism authorities pushing the now UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage Spring Festival travels, more people are expected to travel for a holiday during this CNY.
