Leading indicator of international arrivals to Canada, May 2025
Released: 2025-06-10
894,234
May 2025
-1.3% 
(12-month change)
1,567,275
May 2025
-3.7%
(12-month change)
1,044,678
May 2025
-8.4%
(12-month change)
1,288,742
May 2025
-38.1%
(12-month change)
In May 2025, the preliminary number of international arrivals (returning Canadian residents and non-residents combined) to Canada by air and automobile was 4.8 million, down 16.7% from May 2024. This was the fourth consecutive month of year-over-year declines.
Non-resident trips to Canada by air decline
In May 2025, non-resident arrivals to Canada by air totalled 894,200, down 1.3% year over year (Chart 1). This total comprised 439,800 arrivals by US residents (-0.3% from the same month in 2024), and 454,500 arrivals by overseas residents (-2.3%).
According to the daily traffic data, a daily average of 17,800 US-resident arrivals was observed from Friday, May 23, to Monday, May 26, 2025 (Memorial Day in the United States), which was 49.7% higher than the average for the other Friday-to-Monday periods of the month.
Chart 1
Non-resident trips to Canada by commercial aircraft, May, 2019 to 2025
Infographic 1
Trips to Canada by commercial aircraft, by country of residence, May 2025
Canadian-resident return trips by air decline
In May 2025, Canadian-resident return trips by air from abroad stood at 1.6 million, down 3.7% from the same month one year earlier (Chart 2). Although Canadian-resident return trips from overseas countries increased (1.1 million; +9.8% from May 2024), return trips by air from the United States declined in May 2025 (488,800; -24.2%).
In May 2025, the highest number of returning Canadian-resident arrivals per day was observed on Victoria Day Monday, May 19 (64,000), and the lowest was seen on Thursday, May 29 (41,100).
Chart 2
Canadian-resident return trips from abroad by commercial aircraft, May, 2019 to 2025
US-resident trips to Canada by automobile decrease
In May 2025, the number of US-resident trips to Canada by automobile (1,044,700) declined by 8.4% from the same month in 2024 (Chart 3). This was the fourth consecutive month of year-over-year declines.
The highest numbers of arrivals of US residents were observed on Friday, May 23 (before the Memorial Day long weekend in the United States) (81,900) and Saturday, May 24 (80,800). The average for both days was 90.6% higher than the average of the other Friday-to-Saturday periods of the month.
Chart 3
US-resident trips to Canada by automobile, May, 2019 to 2025
Infographic 2
Trips to Canada by automobile, by country of residence, May 2025
Canadian-resident return trips from the United States by automobile decline
In May 2025, the number of Canadian-resident return trips by automobile from the United States totalled 1.3 million, a steep decline (-38.1%) from the same month in 2024 (Chart 4). May 2025 marked the fifth consecutive month of year-over-year declines.
In May 2025, the highest number of returning Canadian-resident arrivals was observed on May 19 (Victoria Day) (106,900). This number was 169.8% higher than the average for the other Mondays of the month.
Chart 4
Canadian-resident return trips from the United States by automobile, May, 2019 to 2025
Focus on Canada and the United States
In May 2025, the number of arrivals to Canada by US residents by air decreased 0.3% from the same month in 2024, while arrivals by automobile decreased 8.4%.
Meanwhile, Canadian-resident return trips by air fell 24.2% in May 2025 compared with the same month in 2024. Canadian-resident return trips by automobile dropped 38.1%—the fifth consecutive month of year-over-year declines.
For more data and insights on areas touched by the socio-economic relationship between Canada and the United States, see the Focus on Canada and the United States webpage.
Explore tourism data
To further explore current and historical data in an interactive format, see Frontier Counts: Interactive Dashboard.
For other tourism-related information, see the Travel and Tourism Statistics portal.
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Note to readers
This release provides an early indicator of travel based on preliminary data on international arrivals to Canada for May 2025 for air and automobile (arrivals by automobile made by overseas residents are not included in this release). Complete counts will be available with the release of "Travel between Canada and other countries" on July 23.
For more information on concepts, definitions, data sources and methods, refer to Frontier Counts.
Data sources
All counts of arrivals by air are from commercial aircraft and are produced exclusively using primary inspection kiosk (PIK) data received from the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA). PIKs were deployed at Toronto Pearson International Airport Terminal 1 on June 22, 2021, and, as of July 2021, these arrivals are included in the total counts, which has consequently improved coverage. In 2024, PIKs captured 90.3% of all commercial air arrivals.
Counts of arrivals to the country by automobile through land ports equipped with the CBSA's automated Integrated Primary Inspection Line (IPIL) system represent a subset of US-resident trips and Canadian-resident return trips by automobile. In 2024, IPIL land ports captured 88.9% of all automobile entries.
Please be advised that incomplete PIK data were received from CBSA for May 20 and 21, 2025. Although data imputation has been applied to the Leading indicator to approximate the full traveller volume for these dates, users should refer to the upcoming July 23 release of "Travel between Canada and other countries" for complete counts.
Next release
The Leading indicator of international arrivals to Canada for June 2025 will be released on July 10.
Products
The product "Frontier Counts: Interactive Dashboard," part of the Data Visualization Products series (71-607-X), is available.
Contact information
For more information, or to enquire about the concepts, methods or data quality of this release, contact us (toll-free 1-800-263-1136; 514-283-8300; infostats@statcan.gc.ca) or Media Relations (statcan.mediahotline-ligneinfomedias.statcan@statcan.gc.ca).
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