As Canadians make fewer trips to the U.S., domestic travel is on the rise. Data provided to CTVNews.ca by Environics Analytics shows that travel within the country by Canadian residents was up nine per cent in the third quarter of 2025 compared to a year ago, an increase of 6.9 million trips. According to Environics, Canada’s domestic travel boom is being led by multicultural suburban families. Environics Analytics is a Toronto-based marketing and analytical services company owned by Bell Canada. “Canadians are exploring Canada more, and if you look at the numbers, it’s pretty much across the board,” Environics Analytics chief client officer Rupen Seoni told CTVNews.ca. As relations between Canada and the U.S. continue to sour over issues like trade and sovereignty, here’s where Canadians are choosing to travel instead. Canadians are travelling more within their own country Data from Environics shows there has been a recent surge in domestic travel. In terms of percentages, the largest increases in the third quarter of 2025 were seen in Prince Edward Island (13.1 per cent), Ontario (12 per cent), New Brunswick (11.4 per cent) and Saskatchewan (11.3 per cent). When it comes to visitor numbers, the biggest jumps were noted in Ontario (3.6 million), Quebec (1.6 million) and Alberta (697,000). Only the three territories – Yukon, Northwest Territories, and Nunavut – and Newfoundland and Labrador saw domestic tourism numbers drop, which Seoni says could be attributed to higher travel costs. “For the most part, just about every province in Q2 and Q3 of last year saw jumps in domestic tourism, so it’s remarkable,” Seoni said. “Canadians are exploring at home much more and it’s kind of all over.” Multicultural suburban families drive domestic travel Environics tracks consumer behaviour through its PRIZM system, which organizes the country into 67 lifestyle groups based on geographic, demographic and psychographic data. When Environics crunched domestic travel numbers through the lens of its PRIZM system, it found that multicultural and suburban families were leading the increase in domestic travel in Canada. “These are … upper-middle class, reasonably affluent suburban households around big cities (like) Toronto, Vancouver and Montreal,” Seoni explained. “They’re sort of a mix of different cultures living in these suburbs with families, with kids, and so they are driving a lot of the increases in the number of domestic trips, more so than the average Canadian.” Above-average growth was also noted in older, rural households with middle to lower incomes. While all segments of Canadian society saw an increase in domestic travel, the smallest levels of growth were noted across the income spectrum in both young and older urban households. “They didn’t try to venture as far afield in their travels,” Seoni said. “They didn’t see the same sort of growth.” Both Canadians, Americans making fewer cross-border trips According to the latest Statistics Canada data, Canadian residents made 2.2 million return trips from the U.S. in November, a staggering 23.6 per cent year-over-year decrease. In the same period, U.S. residents made 1.3 million trips to Canada, a nine per cent decrease over the previous year. Data from Environics shows a similar pattern in the third quarter of 2025. While trips by Canadians to the U.S. were down by nearly 3.5 million, or 31 per cent, when compared with the third quarter of 2024, trips to Canada by Americans dropped slightly by 43,000, a negative change of about one per cent. “They are far less substantial numbers in terms of decline than you’re seeing Canadians going the other way,” Seoni said of American visitors. “There are (usually) fewer Americans that come to Canada than the other way around.” Canadians are making more overseas trips As Canadians continue to shun U.S. travel, they are also making more overseas trips. According to Statistics Canada, Canadian residents made 1.1 million return trips by air from overseas destinations in November, an increase of 14.1 per cent over the previous year. Statistics Canada data from the second quarter of 2025 shows that the leading overseas destinations for Canadian travellers were Mexico (471,000 visits), France (319,000) and the United Kingdom (279,000). Compared to the second quarter of 2024, the countries that saw the largest increases in Canadian visitors were Japan (up 88 per cent), Spain (70.5 per cent) and France (49.1 per cent). CTV News and CP24 are divisions of Bell Media, which is part of BCE Inc.
