China kicked off its annual Labour-Day travel rush at midnight on 29 April, and early data suggest the 2026 edition will smash post-pandemic records. China Railway Group told Global Times that it expects 158 million rail passenger journeys between 29 April and 6 May—an average of 12,000 trains per day—with a peak of 24 million trips on 1 May. Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) projects 11 million domestic and international air passenger movements during the five-day statutory break. Flight-booking platform Umetrip reports that outbound reservations to Southeast Asia are already 24 percent higher than last year, while bookings to Europe have climbed 13 percent. Cross-border flight searches from Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur and Singapore into China have simultaneously doubled, indicating two-way demand. Border authorities are expanding capacity to handle the surge. Airports in Shanghai, Beijing and Guangzhou have opened additional automated immigration lanes, and land checkpoints in the Greater Bay Area are running 24-hour command centres to manage expected queues. Travellers using the 30-day visa-waiver scheme must still present hotel and onward-ticket evidence; officials warn that random compliance checks will be intensified during peak days. For corporate mobility teams, the numbers translate into potential disruption. Ticket prices on popular intercity routes such as Beijing–Shanghai are up 35 percent week-on-week, and hotel rates in first-tier cities have risen 40 percent. Employers are advised to allow additional transit time for staff shuttling between factories and client sites and to secure flexible bookings that can be re-routed via secondary airports like Hangzhou or Tianjin if slots at primary hubs become saturated.
Source: Global Times
