At the 2026 World Tourism Cooperation and Development Conference within the framework of the China International Trade and Service Fair (CIFTIS) in Beijing, the country's tourism industry recorded a clear shift in the trend of welcoming international visitors.
Instead of just limiting themselves to familiar heritage destinations such as the Forbidden City or the Great Wall of China, foreign tourists are expanding their journey to suburban areas to experience rural homestays, sightseeing by train, or visiting modern scientific and industrial research facilities.
To optimize the experience for tourists, Beijing has just launched the multi-functional digital platform "ChinaBound", comprehensively integrated from booking train and bus tickets, accommodation, exchanging foreign currencies, electronic payments to artificial intelligence (AI) assistants to support itinerary guidance.
At CIFTIS, many technology solutions such as AR language translation glasses with direct display and multilingual automatic translation machines are also introduced to remove language barriers. Trip.com Group travel platform has supported more than 170 scenic spots to operate the multilingual news site, and has also deployed automatic ticket vending machines at nearly 300 attractions.
Favorable opening policies are promoting impressive growth in the number of foreign visitors. Official data shows that in the first 8 months of 2026, the number of foreign visitors entering and exiting through Chinese border gates reached nearly 61.29 million, an increase of 19.5% compared to the same period last year. Notably, the number of visas-free entry reached 23.72 million, accounting for 77.6% of the total number of international visitors and an increase of 26.8%.
The World Tourism Cities Development Report 2025 - 2026 ranks Beijing 5th in the top 100 global tourist cities, after New York, Tokyo, Paris and London. Shanghai and Hong Kong (China) are also in the top 10.
Not only stopping at gateway cities, the trend of slow travel and local cultural experiences is spreading to domestic localities such as Gansu, Xinjiang, Ningxia, Qinghai and Shanxi, where homestay bookings from foreign tourists have skyrocketed in the first half of this year.
