Leading indicator of international arrivals to Canada, November 2025
Released: 2025-12-10
499,406
November 2025
-4.3% 
(12-month change)
1,522,465
November 2025
-0.1%
(12-month change)
841,640
November 2025
-11.5%
(12-month change)
1,278,306
November 2025
-28.6%
(12-month change)
In November, the preliminary number of international arrivals to Canada (returning Canadian residents and non-residents combined) by air and automobile was 4.1 million, down 13.5% from November 2024. This was the 10th consecutive month of year-over-year declines.
Non-resident trips to Canada by air decrease
In November, non-resident arrivals to Canada by air totalled 499,400, down 4.3% from November 2024 (Chart 1). This decrease was driven by a decline in US resident arrivals (-12.6%) and was partially offset by an increase in overseas resident arrivals (+6.6%).
According to daily traffic data, Wednesday, November 26 recorded the highest number of daily arrivals by US residents (12,900). This monthly peak was 72.3% higher than the average of the remaining Wednesdays in the month, and it preceded Thanksgiving in the United States on Thursday, November 27. Saturday, November 1 saw the highest number of arrivals for overseas residents (10,900).
Chart 1
Non-resident trips to Canada by commercial aircraft, November, 2019 to 2025
Infographic 1
Trips to Canada by commercial aircraft, by geography of residence, November 2025
Canadian-resident return trips by air edge down
Canadian-resident return trips by air from abroad stood at 1.5 million in November, down slightly by 0.1% from the same month one year earlier (Chart 2). Although the number of returning Canadian-resident trips from overseas countries by air increased by 11.7% to 1.1 million in November, the number of trips by air from the United States declined 19.3% to 465,800.
In November, the highest number of returning Canadian-resident arrivals per day (68,500) was observed on Sunday, November 16, and the lowest (37,000) was seen on Wednesday, November 5.
Chart 2
Canadian-resident return trips from abroad by commercial aircraft, November, 2019 to 2025
US-resident trips to Canada by automobile decrease
In November, the number of US-resident trips to Canada by automobile (841,600) decreased 11.5% from the same month in 2024 (Chart 3). This was the 10th consecutive month of year-over-year declines.
From Wednesday, November 26 to Friday, November 28, 2025, over Thanksgiving in the United States and Black Friday in both Canada and the United States, an average of 50,200 US-resident arrivals per day was observed. This average was 97.6% higher than those observed for the remaining Wednesday to Friday periods in November.
In 2025, Black Friday landed on November 28. To learn more, see "Will Black Friday hit differently this year for consumers and retailers in a changing economic landscape?" in StatsCAN Plus.
Chart 3
US-resident trips to Canada by automobile, November, 2019 to 2025
Infographic 2
Trips to Canada by automobile, by country of residence, November 2025
Canadian-resident return trips from the United States by automobile decline
In November, the number of Canadian-resident return trips by automobile from the United States totalled 1.3 million, a steep decline (-28.6%) from the same month in 2024 (Chart 4), marking the 11th consecutive month of year-over-year declines.
The highest number of returning Canadian-resident arrivals was observed on Sunday, November 30 (78,800), after US Thanksgiving and Black Friday. This number was 19.8% higher than the average for the other Sundays in November. Also, the number of trips on Tuesday, November 11, Remembrance Day, surpassed the average of the remaining Tuesdays by 31.8%.
Chart 4
Canadian-resident return trips from the United States by automobile, November, 2019 to 2025
Focus on Canada and the United States
In November 2025, the number of arrivals to Canada by US residents by air decreased 12.6% from the same month in 2024, while arrivals by automobile decreased 11.5%.
Meanwhile, Canadian-resident return trips from the United States by air fell 19.3% in November 2025 compared with the same month one year earlier. Canadian-resident return trips by automobile dropped 28.6%.
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.
Note to readers
This release provides an early indicator of travel based on preliminary data on international arrivals to Canada for November 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 January 23, 2026.
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.
Next release
The Leading indicator of international arrivals to Canada for December 2025 will be released on January 12, 2026.
Products
The product "Frontier Counts: Interactive Dashboard," part of the Data Visualization Products series (71-607-X), is available.
The article "Recent changes in Canadian-resident travel to the United States" is available.
Episode 27 of the Eh Sayers podcast "Canadians just aren't California Dreamin' these days" is available.
The infographic "Tourism activity, 2024," is also 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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