Understanding the future trajectory of growth for Canada's tourism industry.
Created in collaboration with Tourism Economics, Destination Canada’s Tourism Outlook model forecasts future tourism visitation and spending driven by domestic and international travel.
Designed for tourism industry stakeholders and Canadians who want to understand the future trajectory of growth for Canada’s tourism industry. A dynamic online visualization of the projected growth of tourism spending and visitation.
Canada’s tourism sector has made significant strides since our previous outlook in Fall 2022. We are now moving past recovery to a much welcome rebound, with tourism spending set to return to pre-COVID levels in 2023, earlier than previously forecasted.
The Fall 2023 Outlook presents two potential futures: staying on the current course and risking a loss of demand due to constraints upon the sector or transforming tourism in Canada to realise its full potential.
The Tourism Outlook to 2030 projects total visitor spending, domestic overnight trips, and overnight trips from the U.S. and key overseas markets.
Note: The Fall 2023 Tourism Outlook was updated with final data for the year 2023 in the spring of 2024. This mid-term update includes final visits data for all markets and final topline spending by domestic and international tourists.
The mid-term update results in adjustments to the short-term projections while maintaining the long-term estimates for visits and spending. A full update to the projections will be completed in the fall of 2024.
Recovery & Rebound
Amid inflationary headwinds, tourism spending showed resilience as Canada exceeded pre-pandemic records in 2023, reaching $113 billion.
An anticipated mild recession for late 2023 and early 2024, failed to materialize despite ongoing inflation and increased interest rates squeezing personal disposable income.
Consumers are continuing to prioritize travel over other categories of discretionary spending.
Transformation & growth
The outlook shows that on our current path total spending by tourists will reach $140 billion by 2030, an increase of 33% compared to 2019. Domestic travellers will spend $97 billion and international tourists will spend $43 billion.
Canadians will make 104 million overnight domestic trips in 2030 and Canada will welcome 27 million international overnight arrivals.
Travel will need to transform to chart a path for sustainable growth in order to achieve our full potential by 2030. Under this outlook, total spending by tourists would reach $160 billion by 2030, with 107 million overnight domestic visits and 28 million international visitors arriving in Canada that year.
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