U.S. Outbound Tourism Snapshot for May 2014

The number of U.S. citizens traveling abroad in the first six months of 2014 increased six percent year-over-year to 32.6 million, according to monthly statistics released this week by the U.S. National Travel and Tourism Office.

Every month, the NTTO releases data regarding recent travel activity, including details about outbound travel from the United States. This is the most recent month for which this information is available.

Slightly more than half of those travelers, 53 percent, crossed borders to Mexico (38 percent) and Canada (15 percent). The other 47 percent of U.S. citizens traveled overseas, with the Europe and the Caribbean, unsurprisingly, capturing the greatest market share.

Worth noting is that Asia captured 7 percent of the market share in the first six months of the year, which was more than Central America (5 percent) and South America (3 percent) despite the distance and higher airfare needed to get there.

Monthly statistics; however, show a slightly different trend.

In June, U.S. outbound travel grew 10 percent to 7.3 million travelers. The regions with the highest growth in terms of inbound U.S. visitors were South America, up 21 percent, and Mexico, up 14 percent.

Asia still experienced growth, but at a slightly slower rate of 8 percent.

U.S. Citizen Travel to International Regions in 2014 by Month (000s)