A drone photo taken on Oct. 6, 2024 shows tourists taking hot air balloons for sightseeing in Wanjing Town of Ningyuan County, central China's Hunan Province. (Photo by Jiang Keqing/Xinhua)

People from smaller cities have demonstrated significant spending power during the National Day holiday from Oct. 1 to 7, as data indicates that a greater number of residents from tier-three and lower cities and counties flew for the first time during the holiday week, including maiden trips abroad.

According to Qunar, a leading online travel agency in China, residents from more than 600 such cities and county seats booked their first flights during the holiday, an increase of 11 counties and county-level cities compared with the same period of last year.

More notably, smaller cities and counties dominated the list of the top 10 cities with the largest increase in first-time flight bookings, said Qunar. First-time flight tickets booked by residents in tier-three and lower cities and counties rose by more than 50 percent compared with the same period in 2023.

The reasons for this trend vary, according to the platform. Some of these cities have recently constructed new airports, while others, such as Fuyang in Anhui Province, Jieyang in Guangdong Province, and Linyi in Shandong Province, have seen scores of new flight routes added since the start of the year, said Cai Muzi, a researcher at Qunar's Big Data Research Institute.

Improved access to nearby airports also contributed to the increase. For instance, in Xuchang, Henan Province, residents can complete all security checks locally before boarding their flight at Xinzheng International Airport in Zhengzhou, the provincial capital, Cai added.

Residents of smaller cities and counties also showed a strong interest in overseas travel during this holiday, as first-time bookings for international flights from this group surged by more than 70 percent year-on-year, according to Qunar.

A broader analysis of flight and hotel bookings on the platform reveals that outbound travel orders from these areas nearly quadrupled compared with last year. In contrast, bookings from tier-two cities rose by 70 percent, new first-tier cities saw a 40 percent increase, while first-tier cities remained largely unchanged.

Ctrip, another leading online travel agency, confirmed this emerging trend in a report released Monday on tourism and consumption during the National Day holiday. It noted that residents of fourth- and fifth-tier cities have emerged as a new growth segment for outbound travel. However, this demographic tends to favor short-haul destinations, with 13 of their top 20 outbound travel countries being short-haul options.

In contrast, residents of first- and second-tier cities are traveling farther and spending more. Among their top 20 outbound travel destinations, 12 long-haul countries, including the United Kingdom, the United States and Australia, account for 37 percent of their total overseas tourism spending, according to Ctrip.

As more residents from smaller cities travel abroad, they will create more growth opportunities for the global tourism industry, said Mao Lin, a Ctrip researcher.

Meanwhile, smaller cities and counties emerged as attractive destinations during the 2024 National Day holiday, with bookings seeing the largest increases in these areas on the Qunar platform. Search terms such as "fewer tourists," "niche destinations" and "traveling against the flow" have risen significantly in popularity.

As major tourist spots become overcrowded at this time of year, a growing number of people, particularly those from tier-one and tier-two cities, choose to spend their holidays in county seats with lower concentration of tourists. This trend has driven up demand for hotels with better accommodation facilities in these areas, said Cai.

The bed-and-breakfast (B&B) booking platform Tujia reported a year-on-year surge of over 50 percent in accommodation bookings in counties during the holiday, a growth rate that outpaced the overall bookings on the platform. These bookings were distributed at B&Bs across more than 1,300 counties nationwide, according to the platform.

Xiaobi (pseudonym) runs a 21-room B&B near the renowned Jiuzhai Valley nature reserve in Jiuzhaigou County, southwest China's Sichuan Province. The recent National Day holiday proved to be both exhausting and rewarding for her. "We experienced one of our highest visitor peaks in recent years," she said.

Xiaobi attributed the increase in visitors to the extension of high-speed rail and expressways. In late August, a bullet train station became operational in the area, reducing the travel time from the provincial capital of Chengdu to Jiuzhaigou from seven to eight hours to around 1.5 hours.

As more people opted to stagger their travel plans during the National Day holiday, the travel peak is expected to last longer than in previous years, spanning from Sept. 27 to Oct. 9, said Qunar researcher Cai.

This has resulted in a smoother curve for flight prices, with fewer dives compared with the same period in previous years. This trend is more favorable for travelers, leading to increased trips and creating a longer tail effect for the golden week holiday, she said.

The National Day holiday in China is traditionally one of the most lucrative periods for consumer spending, particularly in sectors such as tourism and film.

Official data shows that a remarkable 765 million domestic trips were made by tourists during this holiday. This resulted in a total expenditure of 700.8 billion yuan (approximately 99.11 billion U.S. dollars), a 6.3 percent increase compared with the same period in 2023 and a 7.9 percent growth compared with 2019.