China Will Be the Largest Overseas Visitor Market for the U.S. by 2020
Photo Credit: Chinese tourists on the Brooklyn Bridge in New York City. Flickr / Vincent Desjardins
Skift Take
Chinese travelers will continue to be more common in many U.S. markets during the next five years, but their numbers will not grow as fast as they have over the last decade.
By 2020, China will be the largest international source market for the U.S. excluding Canada and Mexico, a pivotal shift in the visitor pie chart that has been dominated by Japan and the U.K. for decades.
That's according to a report from the Pacific Asia Travel Association, which analyzes international travel and tourism trends in the Asia-Pacific region. It forecasts that nearly five million Chinese travelers will visit the U.S. each year by 2020, with an annual growth rate of about 13 percent during the next five years. Last year, nearly three million Chinese travelers visited U.S. destinations, making China the third largest overseas source market.
That pegs China accounting for nearly six percent market share of all U.S. overseas visitors by 2020 compared to 4.27 percent and 4.03 percent for the UK
