The great Canadian travel pivot: Why millions are rerouting their trips this year

Canadians hit the road in a big way in 2025. New data from Statistics Canada’s National Travel Survey and Visitor Travel Survey (1) shows Canadians took more than 99 million trips from April to June — an 8.5% increase over the same period last year. But not all travel categories moved in the same direction. While domestic and overseas travel grew, trips to the U.S. dropped sharply.

These quarterly results offer one of the clearest snapshots yet of how Canadians are reshaping their travel habits in a global economy burdened with U.S. tariffs, supply chain constraints and inflationary pressures.

Domestic travel is booming

In the second quarter of 2025, Canadians took 90.6 million domestic trips in the second quarter of 2025 — up 10.9% from 2024 (2). In the same time period, same-day visits climbed 12.4%, while overnight trips rose 8.4%.

Spending also surged. Canadians spent $20.3 billion on domestic tourism — up 13.5% year-over-year. The average same-day visit cost travellers $101, while overnight trips averaged $449 and lasted 2.6 nights.

This rise in domestic travel reflects several possible factors, including high inflation encouraging closer-to-home travel, favourable domestic airline competition, more Canadians taking advantage of provincial tourism incentives, and a desire to support Canada in the midst of U.S. threats.

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Most popular reasons for travel within Canada

There were a variety of reasons that Canadians opted to visit their own country in 2025. The most popular were:

• Visiting friends and relatives
• Holidays and leisure
• Shopping and personal trips

This year’s increase builds on a broader multi-year recovery trend. According to Statistics Canada’s tourism portal (3), domestic travel began rebounding sharply in 2022 and 2023, but 2025’s numbers suggest demand has fully stabilized — and even exceeded pre-pandemic volumes for certain trip types.

Canadians are skipping the U.S.

One of the most striking shifts in 2025 is the steep decline in U.S. travel.

Canadians took 5.6 million trips to the United States in Q2 2025 — a 21.6% drop from the same quarter in 2024.

The decrease is notable given that 2024 also showed signs of softening in cross-border travel, driven by a weaker Canadian dollar, higher accommodation costs and rising U.S. airfare. This year’s data suggests the trend is accelerating rather than stabilizing.

According to Statistics Canada data:

• $4.8 billion spent in the U.S. — down 14.9%
• Average same-day spend was $125
• Average overnight spend was $1,312 for 7.3 nights

It appears that budget-concious travellers may be staying away from U.S. hotels and rental cars — as they are still among the most expensive in the world, As a result, Canadians are redirecting spending elsewhere — especially to overseas destinations.

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Overseas travel is rising sharply

While Canadians pulled back from U.S. travel, trips overseas climbed 10.4% to 3.3 million visits; however, it was the increase in spending that was so dramatic. According to Statistics Canada, Canadians shelled out $8.1 billion, up 28.4% year over year.

This suggests Canadians aren't necessarily travelling more often but going further and spending more.

According to the StatsCan report, the average overseas visit cost $2,435 and lasted 13.2 nights.

Overall, the top desinations for Canadians in 2025 included:

• Mexico – with 471,000 visits in 2025
• France – with 319,000 visits
• United Kingdom – with 279,000 visits

While these were the most popular spots, travel to certain countries grew dramatically. For instance, trips to Japan increased 88%, trips to Spain increased 70.5% and trips to France increased by 49.1%.

Popular sun destinations, however, saw declines:

• Dominican Republic — a drop of 20.5%
• Cuba — a drop of 21.1%
• Thailand — a drop of 67.3%

These shifts possibly reflect a combination of geopolitical stability, improved air capacity, and changing traveller preferences toward cultural and long-haul trips.

Additional historical data on overseas travel is available through StatsCan’s “Travel between Canada and other countries” data tables (4).

Fewer Americans visiting Canada — but they’re spending more

Inbound tourism showed mixed results. American visitors to Canada dropped 5.6% in the second quarter of 2025, down to 6.1 million trips. Despite this drop in visitors, those that did venture north of the border spent more with American travellers spending $4.6 billion, an increase of 14.8%.

Statistics Canada data showed that the average overnight spend for Americans travelling to Canada was $1,191, over 5.1 nights.

Overseas visitors, meanwhile, increased 5.8% to 1.9 million trips and spent $3.7 billion. The typical overseas visitor spent $1,957 and stayed 16.8 nights.

Where did visitors to Canada come from?

People from across the globe came to see our nation, but the most popular country of origin included:

• United Kingdom – 250,000 trips (a 9.2% increase)
• India – 185,000
• France – 147,000 (as slight year-over-year decrease)

Overall trends for inbound and outbound trips

Taken together, the 2025 data points to a clear pattern that Canadians are choosing domestic and long-haul travel over U.S. getaways. It also shows that Canadians are willing to spend more when on an international trip.

On the inbound side, the reduction in U.S. tourists to Canada was certainly noticed; however, the decline in U.S. tourists was offset by growth from overseas markets.

Article sources

We rely only on vetted sources and credible third-party reporting. For details, see our editorial ethics and guidelines.

Statistics Canada: The Daily (1, 2); Statistics Canada (3); Statistics Canada (4)