As the Mid-Autumn Festival and National Day holiday approach, tourism in county-level destinations continues to gain momentum. Recent holiday trend reports from multiple online travel platforms show that small airports, high-speed rail-connected counties, distinctive ancient towns, mountain retreats for summer escapes, and intangible cultural heritage experiences have become key booking keywords. Hotel, homestay, and car rental orders in some lower-tier cities and county destinations are growing ahead of schedule. Travelers are no longer only flocking to traditional large cities; slow-paced small-town travel is emerging as a significant complement to long-holiday consumption.
The rise of county tourism stems from two key factors. First, the expansion of high-speed rail networks and self-driving radii has made surrounding small towns easier to incorporate into short-haul long-holiday itineraries. Second, consumers are placing greater emphasis on pricing, experience density, and avoiding crowds, and county destinations can absorb dispersed demand through homestays, dining, night tours, rural markets, and family-friendly activities. However, once visitor flows arrive, service quality, parking, restroom facilities, dining capacity, and safety management are quickly put to the test.
Data from Qichacha shows that there are currently over 2.896 million tourism-related enterprises in operation or survival status nationwide, with approximately 234,000 newly registered such enterprises added so far in 2026. Geographically, Guangdong Province, Shandong Province, and Sichuan Province lead in the number of tourism-related enterprises, with over 148,000, 116,000, and 94,000 respectively. The beneficiaries of county-level cultural tourism extend beyond scenic spots. Homestays, dining, transport connections, performing arts events, cultural and creative retail, and local agricultural products can all be driven, forming a longer consumption chain.
Nevertheless, county destinations also face risks of homogenized replication, over-reliance on internet-famous attractions, and insufficient peak-season reception capacity. Those who can convert one-time visitor flows into repeat visits and word-of-mouth reputation will truly reap the long-holiday dividend. Going forward, competition in county-level cultural tourism will shift from marketing to operations. Local governments need to refine public services, merchant management, event offerings, and safety contingency plans, while enterprises must pivot from single-point projects to integrated services covering itineraries, accommodation, dining, and shopping. Whether small-town tourism can sustain long-term growth depends on its ability to keep visitors willing to stay even after peak periods.
From an industry chain perspective, county tourism will also drive upgrades in local life services. The accommodation sector must address hygiene standards and cancellation policies, the dining sector needs to handle concentrated visitor flows, the transport sector must improve transfer efficiency, and the cultural and creative retail sector should avoid simple white-labeling. The long holiday serves merely as a traffic gateway; what truly determines the resilience of county-level cultural tourism is whether local merchants can maintain stable supply during peak periods and continue developing compound scenarios such as study tours, wellness retreats, and sporting events during the off-season.
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