China's Spring Festival travel rush starts with record trips expected

BEIJING - At 12:40 am Monday, train K4069 pulled out of Beijing West Railway Station, becoming the first passenger train to depart from Beijing as part of the 2026 Spring Festival travel rush. On it were travelers either heading home or setting out on leisure travel, as the country's annual tale of movement and reunion began to unfold.

The Spring Festival, also known as Chinese New Year, falls on Feb 17 this year, and the official holiday lasts nine days. The annual travel surge, known as chunyun and often described as the world's largest human migration, is expected to generate a record 9.5 billion inter-regional passenger trips during the 40-day period running from Monday to March 13 this year.

Of this total, road trips remain the dominant mode of travel, accounting for approximately 80 percent.

An estimated 540 million passenger trips will be handled by the country's railways, while the civil aviation sector will see 95 million passenger trips. Both the overall scale and daily peak traffic of rail and air travel are expected to hit new highs.

While passenger trips are tipped to reach a new peak, journeys are also set to be smoother.

China's expressways now cover 99 percent of cities with a population of over 200,000 and the country's high-speed railway network has exceeded 50,000 km, reaching 97 percent of cities with an urban population of more than 500,000. Aviation services, meanwhile, currently reach 92.6 percent of prefecture-level administrative units.

During this year's travel rush, transport authorities will further leverage the strengths of an integrated transport system and improve comprehensive transport services.

Rail, road, waterway and civil aviation departments will strengthen analysis of passenger demand and increase capacity supply in key areas, on popular routes and during peak hours to the fullest extent possible to meet people's travel needs, said Li Chunlin, deputy head of the National Development and Reform Commission.

Festive cheer, notably, will also accompany travelers.

At Yan'an Station in Northwest China's Shaanxi province, for example, drums thundered and red ribbons fluttered as waist drum performers leapt and danced. A performer also sang the original song titled "High-speed Rail Comes to Our Yan'an" for travelers, filling the waiting hall with a festive Spring Festival atmosphere.

More than 1,000 km Southwest of Yan'an, at Chongqing East Railway Station in Southwest China, handwritten Spring Festival couplets were handed out to travelers, adding to the holiday spirit.

In addition to travel back to hometowns, "heading north to chase snow" and "going south to seek warmth" have become popular holiday options.

Data from travel services platform Qunar showed that the nine-day holiday is prompting more mid-holiday trips to tourist attractions this year.

Airlines have increased flight frequency to popular destinations and streamlined services to accommodate travelers' needs, such as opening dedicated counters for ski equipment check-in at Beijing Daxing International Airport.

As the Spring Festival approaches, orders for New Year goods have also been rising across shopping and logistics platforms.

Data from delivery service provider Lalamove, known as Huolala in Chinese, revealed that from Jan 1 to 25, 2026, orders for food and grain-and-oil products rose by more than 40 percent from the same period of 2025, while orders for clothing and fabrics increased by nearly 50 percent and orders for fresh food doubled compared with a year earlier.

In Luoyang, a city in Central China's Henan province with a long history of growing peonies, SF Express's local branch has assigned over 100 couriers to handle peony pickups during the holiday season and will use coordinated air, high-speed rail and cold-chain transport. More than 90 percent of orders are expected to arrive by the following day, allowing people far away to also enjoy these flowers.

Chunyun carries people's hopes for a better life, returns some to their places of birth and mirrors the country's forward momentum, as journeys across the country weave the vivid picture of a mobile China.