China’s hospitality sector rang in 2026 on a high note. People’s Daily reports that airports in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen and Chengdu arranged red-carpet ceremonies for the first planeloads of foreign guests on 1 January, symbolising a broader rebound that saw overall inbound bookings jump 38 percent in the year’s first week.
Online-agency Qunar recorded foreign-passport bookings to 97 mainland cities during the three-day New-Year break, with Shanghai, Guangzhou and Beijing topping the list. Analysts point to China’s rapid rollout of unilateral visa waivers—most recently for Germany, Argentina, Brazil and a swathe of ASEAN states—as the decisive catalyst. In Hainan, the extension of a 15-day cruise-tour exemption plus 240-hour air-transit waivers produced the fastest growth in inbound capacity, while Chongqing leveraged social-media campaigns to deliver a 170 % spike in arrivals.
Trip.com’s latest white paper underscores the structural impact: in the first three quarters of 2025, foreign arrival bookings had already doubled year-on-year, with traffic from visa-waiver countries up 153 percent. Stakeholders now forecast up to 40 million arrivals in 2026—still short of the 65 million recorded in 2019 but enough to restore profitability to many mid-sized hotels and regional carriers.
![Inbound tourism to China surges 38 % in first week of 2026 under expanded visa-free scheme]()
For multinational firms the numbers matter. Thirty-day visa-free stays not only remove the cost of invitation letters but also allow project managers to string together multi-city itineraries on a single trip, reducing air-ticket spend and carbon footprints. Companies with dormant China projects are dusting off site-visit schedules; several engineering contractors tell VisaHQ they have shifted from quarterly to monthly travel rotations.
To streamline these renewed travel rotations, VisaHQ’s digital platform centralises up-to-date information on China’s evolving entry policies, delivers real-time alerts when local requirements change, and can fast-track any residual visa or permit applications for employees who still need paperwork. Corporations and individual travellers can explore customised support tools at https://www.visahq.com/china/.
Yet the boom will strain capacity. Smaller cities are racing to add bilingual signage, duty-free outlets and digital-payment guidance. Mobility leaders should prepare employees for uneven service standards and monitor local government bulletins for pop-up registration requirements—particularly around the Spring Festival peak in mid-February.
Online-agency Qunar recorded foreign-passport bookings to 97 mainland cities during the three-day New-Year break, with Shanghai, Guangzhou and Beijing topping the list. Analysts point to China’s rapid rollout of unilateral visa waivers—most recently for Germany, Argentina, Brazil and a swathe of ASEAN states—as the decisive catalyst. In Hainan, the extension of a 15-day cruise-tour exemption plus 240-hour air-transit waivers produced the fastest growth in inbound capacity, while Chongqing leveraged social-media campaigns to deliver a 170 % spike in arrivals.
Trip.com’s latest white paper underscores the structural impact: in the first three quarters of 2025, foreign arrival bookings had already doubled year-on-year, with traffic from visa-waiver countries up 153 percent. Stakeholders now forecast up to 40 million arrivals in 2026—still short of the 65 million recorded in 2019 but enough to restore profitability to many mid-sized hotels and regional carriers.
For multinational firms the numbers matter. Thirty-day visa-free stays not only remove the cost of invitation letters but also allow project managers to string together multi-city itineraries on a single trip, reducing air-ticket spend and carbon footprints. Companies with dormant China projects are dusting off site-visit schedules; several engineering contractors tell VisaHQ they have shifted from quarterly to monthly travel rotations.
To streamline these renewed travel rotations, VisaHQ’s digital platform centralises up-to-date information on China’s evolving entry policies, delivers real-time alerts when local requirements change, and can fast-track any residual visa or permit applications for employees who still need paperwork. Corporations and individual travellers can explore customised support tools at https://www.visahq.com/china/.
Yet the boom will strain capacity. Smaller cities are racing to add bilingual signage, duty-free outlets and digital-payment guidance. Mobility leaders should prepare employees for uneven service standards and monitor local government bulletins for pop-up registration requirements—particularly around the Spring Festival peak in mid-February.
