China's Nine Day Spring Festival Break for 2027 Sparks Rush for Flights and Overseas Tours

February 5 to 13 Break Sends Travel Searches Surging

China's Spring Festival holiday will run from February 5 to 13 in 2027, giving families nine consecutive days for reunions and travel. The schedule comes with two Sunday workdays, January 31 and February 14, as working time is rearranged around the country's biggest family celebration.

Travel companies recorded an immediate response to the holiday announcement on November 5. Qunar said searches for flights departing during the festival increased by 3.2 times within half an hour. Its early flight bookings for the holiday were already 43% higher than for the equivalent holiday period in 2026.

Tongcheng Travel recorded a 189% increase from the previous month in searches for Spring Festival flights and hotels. Bookings for flights departing in the week before Lunar New Year's Eve rose 61%, showing that some travellers were securing seats before the official break begins.

The first purchases reveal several different holidays taking shape: a February 5 morning flight from Shanghai to Harbin, a journey from Shenzhen to the ski destination of Altay in Xinjiang, and a February 4 evening departure from Guangzhou to Bangkok. Families are also booking flights for parents to join adult children in major cities, reversing the traditional journey home.

Nine days give travellers room to combine activities that are harder to fit into a shorter break: visiting relatives, taking a domestic trip and, for some, travelling abroad. Travel agencies say Europe, Australia and New Zealand are among the destinations attracting early demand.

Why Nine Days Off Means Four Statutory Holidays

The legal basis is the revised Measures for National Holidays and Commemorative Days, published under State Council Decree No. 795 in November 2024 and effective from January 1, 2025. The fourth revision increased China's annual statutory public holidays from 11 to 13 days.

Spring Festival gained one statutory day, bringing its total to four, from Lunar New Year's Eve through the third day of the lunar year. Labour Day also gained one day. Including New Year's Eve addressed a practical problem for workers who previously might still have been required to work as their families prepared for the reunion dinner.

The longer continuous break comes from combining those statutory holidays with weekends and rearranged working days. Under the revised framework, Spring Festival generally produces an eight day break. In 2027, New Year's Eve falls on Friday, February 5, and the calendar allows the announced arrangement to extend to nine days.

The measures also say that, except in special circumstances, consecutive working days around a holiday should generally number no more than six. For workers planning their return, February 14 is therefore part of the working calendar even though it falls on a Sunday.

The Dates Behind the Booking Rush

The travel market began moving before the holiday announcement. Spring Tour said its first booking for a long distance overseas trip during the 2027 festival was made in October, with Iceland as the destination. By the day before the announcement, bookings for its longer overseas journeys were already more than 50% above the equivalent period a year earlier.

The main dates for travellers and employers are:

• January 1, 2025: The revised holiday measures took effect.
• October before the 2027 festival: Spring Tour recorded its first booking for a long distance overseas festival trip, to Iceland.
• November 5: The detailed 2027 holiday announcement triggered sharp increases in travel searches.
• January 31, 2027: A Sunday becomes a scheduled workday.
• February 5 to 13, 2027: The Spring Festival holiday runs for nine consecutive days.
• February 14, 2027: Work resumes on a Sunday.

Travellers discussing ways to extend the break have also circulated a plan described as taking five days of leave to obtain 15 days away from work. The actual length available to an individual depends on the dates chosen, the employer's schedule and approval for annual leave.

What the Search and Booking Figures Show

Tongcheng's 189% monthly increase means its flight and hotel searches reached about 2.89 times the previous month's level. Its 264% rise in searches for routes associated with parents travelling to their children's cities means those searches reached about 3.64 times their earlier level.

Umetrip recorded another burst of interest between 5 p.m. and 6 p.m. on November 5. Searches for Spring Festival flights increased by more than 220% compared with the corresponding hour a day earlier, while searches for the January 1 to 3 New Year holiday increased by more than 20%.

The figures capture different parts of the booking process. Searches measure people looking at options; bookings measure purchases already made. Qunar's 43% increase in festival flight bookings therefore gives a separate measure of customers committing money, alongside the much faster movements in searches.

No nationwide passenger forecast or comprehensive Spring Festival airfare average was given. The early figures describe activity on individual platforms and at travel agencies, while the final scale and cost of the holiday rush will become clearer as more seats and packages are sold.

Warm Weather, Snow and Local Traditions Compete

Hainan's Sanya and Haikou remain prominent choices for travellers seeking warmer weather. Kunming also appears among Qunar's leading destinations for flights arriving on Lunar New Year's Eve. At the other end of the temperature range, Harbin and Changchun both rank among its top ten.

Qunar's ten leading destinations for early New Year's Eve flight bookings are Shanghai, Haikou, Sanya, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Kunming, Beijing, Harbin, Ningbo and Changchun. Tongcheng's wider festival search list also includes Chengdu, showing how demand extends beyond beach holidays and winter sports.

Travel companies reported rising enquiries for skiing and ice sightseeing packages in Harbin and Changchun. U Tour also identified interest in ski and winter travel products for Altay and Chongli, giving travellers alternatives across several regions rather than concentrating all snow holidays in northeastern China.

Chaozhou and Shantou in the Chaoshan area, Quanzhou and Xi'an are drawing families interested in festival customs. Searches have increased for temple fairs, lantern displays and traditional cultural activities. These trips put local celebrations at the centre of the itinerary, alongside the separate demand for beaches and ski slopes.

Parents Travel to Their Children's Cities

Tongcheng said searches for routes associated with reverse Spring Festival travel rose 264% from the previous month as of November 5. The term describes parents and other older relatives travelling to the cities where younger family members work, rather than those workers all returning to their hometowns.

Interest increased in flights from smaller cities and county areas to major centres in the Yangtze River Delta and Pearl River Delta. These regions include many of China's busiest employment centres, making them natural gathering places for families whose members live apart.

Older travellers accounted for more than 35% of orders on these reverse travel routes. That is more than one in three orders, a substantial share that helps explain why large employment centres appear alongside conventional holiday destinations in the early booking rankings.

For families, the change is concrete: the reunion takes place where the younger generation lives. A longer stay can then include nearby sightseeing, a hot spring visit or a theme park trip. Travel businesses also recorded increases in related accommodation orders, extending the spending beyond the incoming flight.

Europe and Southern Summer Trips Gain Ground

Spring Tour has prepared nearly 50 European itineraries covering more than 30 countries and territories. Its programme spans western Europe, eastern Europe and the Balkans, southern Europe and northern Europe, with options including journeys through several countries and longer stays in Switzerland or Italy.

Northern lights trips feature Finland, Norway and Iceland, with Russia's Murmansk also available. U Tour reported healthy sales for Nordic cruises, Nordic land tours and Iceland routes. These products connect the longer holiday with seasonal experiences that require substantial travel time from China.

Australia and New Zealand are attracting enquiries for a different reason: Spring Festival falls during their summer. U Tour said the recovery in flight capacity had broadened the available product range, while Spring Tour planned itineraries exploring both New Zealand's North and South Islands.

U Tour said its Spring Festival programme had passed the halfway point in its booking progress. Spain, Portugal, Egypt, Sri Lanka, Australia and New Zealand were among the popular destinations. Closer to China, Qunar recorded particularly strong growth in interest in Busan, Jakarta and Penang, extending demand beyond the most familiar overseas holiday stops.

Some Longer Tours Cost Less Despite Strong Demand

Guangzhilv said enquiries and customer bookings for winter school holiday and Spring Festival overseas trips during the current week had risen about 930% compared with the whole previous week. That comparison measures a rapid burst of activity after holiday information became available.

The agency's overseas product prices were broadly unchanged from the equivalent period a year earlier, while some longer itineraries were around 10% cheaper. It linked the adjustments to recovering international flight capacity and increased availability of tourism services abroad.

Guangzhilv also recorded a 375% monthly rise in enquiries and registrations for its premium European tours. It identified affluent families, experienced international travellers and older customers seeking richer travel experiences as important customer groups for those products.

Travellers therefore face two developments at once: a wider choice of international products and early competition for particular departures. Guangzhilv expects seasonal trips involving northern lights, skiing and flowers in the opposite hemisphere to fill especially quickly. The price reductions described by the agency apply to selected longer tours, while its broader overseas range remains close to last year's prices.

A Reunion First, Then a Holiday

Wang Xingbin, a veteran tourism specialist, described the practical opportunity created by the longer break as a sequence of family visits followed by leisure travel. His description of the emerging pattern was:

Return home first, travel later.

That sequence connects several strands of the early demand. Departures in the week before New Year's Eve allow some families to complete their reunion visit before using the remaining days for another journey. Parents travelling to employment centres create a different starting point, with the family already gathered in a large city.

Spring Group president Wang Wei said the company had stepped up work across its product, sales and purchasing teams after the announcement. Staff were handling more enquiries and contacting partners to secure the services needed for the holiday, while reviewing product choice, value and quality.

The immediate change for the industry is a longer window in which to sell different kinds of trips. For households, it is more room to fit family time and travel into the same break. The early bookings already range from domestic snow holidays to Bangkok departures and Iceland tours, showing how differently families are using the same nine days.

Key Points

• China's 2027 Spring Festival holiday runs from February 5 to 13, with work scheduled on January 31 and February 14.
• The nine day break combines four statutory Spring Festival holidays with weekends and rearranged working days.
• Qunar reported early festival flight bookings up 43% from the equivalent 2026 period.
• Tongcheng recorded a 189% monthly increase in festival flight and hotel searches and a 264% rise for reverse reunion routes.
• Older travellers accounted for more than 35% of orders on reverse reunion routes.
• Warm weather destinations, snow holidays, traditional celebrations and longer overseas trips are all attracting demand.
• Some longer overseas tours at Guangzhilv were around 10% cheaper than a year earlier, while its broader overseas prices were broadly stable.