SHANGHAI – China’s largest B2B travel trade show, ITB China 2026, raised its curtain at the Shanghai World Expo Exhibition & Convention Center on 27 May. Over three days more than 900 tourism boards, airlines, hotel groups, cruise lines and technology vendors from 85 countries will meet 1,700 pre-qualified Chinese buyers in an estimated 46,000 prescheduled appointments. This year’s edition is markedly different from the cautious, mostly domestic-oriented show that returned in 2024. Since late-2025 Beijing has rolled out an unprecedented wave of inbound-friendly measures—waiving visas for 50 countries, restoring transit-visa exemptions at 65 ports of entry, and fast-tracking e-payment onboarding for foreign bank cards. According to the Shanghai General Station of Immigration Inspection, the city recorded 1.172 million foreign arrivals by mid-March, up 20 percent year-on-year, and two-thirds entered on visa-free or 144-hour transit-free schemes.
![ITB China 2026 Opens in Shanghai as Visa-Free Policies Spark Inbound Travel Boom]()
For travelers who still need help deciphering the fast-changing entry landscape, VisaHQ can step in as a one-stop resource. The company’s online platform (https://www.visahq.com/china/) explains the latest exemptions, processes electronic visa applications when a permit is still required, and monitors consular updates—services that lighten the load for both leisure visitors and corporate travel planners.
Exhibitors say those policy tailwinds are already translating into bookings. Indian tour operator Gautam Kumar Bakuly told Shanghai Daily that his firm is finalising inbound packages combining Beijing, Shanghai and Xi’an, helped by streamlined online visa systems and competitive India–China airfares. Royal Caribbean’s China president Benjamin Bouldin revealed that foreign nationals accounted for 88 percent of passengers on the line’s most recent Shanghai departure in March, adding that cruise bookings from Europe and the Middle East are “tracking 15–20 percent above 2019”. For destination marketing organisations the stakes are high. Abu Dhabi’s Department of Culture and Tourism unveiled a 400 percent increase in China seat capacity from October via a new Etihad–China Eastern codeshare, while Italy’s Friuli Venezia Giulia pitched slow-travel routes that dovetail with China’s extended 30-day visa-free stays. Conference panels echoed a common theme: with entry barriers lowered, service quality must keep pace. Speakers from Trip.com Group and Tencent Maps urged suppliers to provide multi-currency digital payments, AI-powered Mandarin chatbots and carbon-tracking tools demanded by younger, sustainability-minded Chinese travellers. Inbound specialists, meanwhile, warned that visa-free visitors still require registration with public-security authorities and urged hotels to adopt the National Immigration Administration’s new online accommodation-reporting platform to avoid compliance snags. For multinationals the implications go beyond tourism. Corporations such as Schneider Electric and Siemens dispatched mobility teams to ITB’s corporate travel pavilion to renegotiate China hotel rate caps and explore green-lane immigration services for short-cycle project teams. As China targets 80 million inbound visitors by 2030, the consensus here is clear: frictionless entry is back on the agenda—and global players that re-engage early stand to gain first-mover advantage.
For travelers who still need help deciphering the fast-changing entry landscape, VisaHQ can step in as a one-stop resource. The company’s online platform (https://www.visahq.com/china/) explains the latest exemptions, processes electronic visa applications when a permit is still required, and monitors consular updates—services that lighten the load for both leisure visitors and corporate travel planners.
Exhibitors say those policy tailwinds are already translating into bookings. Indian tour operator Gautam Kumar Bakuly told Shanghai Daily that his firm is finalising inbound packages combining Beijing, Shanghai and Xi’an, helped by streamlined online visa systems and competitive India–China airfares. Royal Caribbean’s China president Benjamin Bouldin revealed that foreign nationals accounted for 88 percent of passengers on the line’s most recent Shanghai departure in March, adding that cruise bookings from Europe and the Middle East are “tracking 15–20 percent above 2019”. For destination marketing organisations the stakes are high. Abu Dhabi’s Department of Culture and Tourism unveiled a 400 percent increase in China seat capacity from October via a new Etihad–China Eastern codeshare, while Italy’s Friuli Venezia Giulia pitched slow-travel routes that dovetail with China’s extended 30-day visa-free stays. Conference panels echoed a common theme: with entry barriers lowered, service quality must keep pace. Speakers from Trip.com Group and Tencent Maps urged suppliers to provide multi-currency digital payments, AI-powered Mandarin chatbots and carbon-tracking tools demanded by younger, sustainability-minded Chinese travellers. Inbound specialists, meanwhile, warned that visa-free visitors still require registration with public-security authorities and urged hotels to adopt the National Immigration Administration’s new online accommodation-reporting platform to avoid compliance snags. For multinationals the implications go beyond tourism. Corporations such as Schneider Electric and Siemens dispatched mobility teams to ITB’s corporate travel pavilion to renegotiate China hotel rate caps and explore green-lane immigration services for short-cycle project teams. As China targets 80 million inbound visitors by 2030, the consensus here is clear: frictionless entry is back on the agenda—and global players that re-engage early stand to gain first-mover advantage.
