The 2026 World Cup in Mexico and the United States came to an end, and Spain once again lifted the trophy after 16 years. This victory not only brought joy to fans but also sparked a wave of tourism to Spain.
According to data from the online travel platform Qunar, as of July 20, the search volume for many routes in China to Spain has increased significantly. The search volume for the flight from Shenzhen to Barcelona has risen by 33 times within just one hour. The search volume for the flight from Kunming to Barcelona has also increased by 10 times. Rapid increases have also been observed for routes from Qingdao and Guiyang to Barcelona.
Data shows that not only Barcelona has seen a surge in searches, but the search volume for Kunming-Madrid has increased by 8 times, that for Jinan-Madrid has increased by 8 times, and the search volume for flights to Marrakech has increased by more than 10 times.
Even the remote island of Tenerife in the Atlantic Ocean has seen a surge in popularity. The number of flight searches increased by 19 times within a week, and just one hour before Spain won the championship, the number of searches had already increased by 5 times.
According to the Spanish version of 'European Times' on its WeChat public account 'Xiwen', published on the 21st, in fact, Chinese tourists have been favoring Spain more and more in recent years.
According to the latest data from the Spanish National Statistics Institute (INE), in 2024, approximately 650,000 Chinese tourists visited Spain, with total spending exceeding 1.8 billion euros (about 13.9 billion RMB). The most popular destinations remain Madrid, Barcelona, and Seville.
Reports indicate that, with the added ‘traffic boost’ of being a World Cup champion, many industry insiders believe that Spain could see a new wave of Chinese tourist growth in 2027.
