China’s Covid-19 policy rollback prompts surge in searches for mainland flights from Hong Kong, with 1 website reporting 500 per cent traffic spike
- Trip.com Group says search traffic for flights from Hong Kong to mainland soared by 500 per cent during 30-minute window before Monday midnight
- Spike in search traffic comes minutes after mainland authorities announce rollback of coronavirus travel restrictions and Covid-19’s threat status from January 8
Interest in visiting mainland China via Hong Kong has spiked after authorities there said they would axe cross-border Covid-19 travel curbs, with an online ticketing agency logging a more than 500 per cent jump in search traffic just minutes after the announcement.
Online travel agency Trip.com Group on Tuesday said searches on two of its sites for flights to the mainland had shot up immediately after Beijing’s National Health Commission at around 11.10pm on Monday revealed the shared border would fully reopen on January 8.
The company said flights from Hong Kong to major cities such as Beijing, Shanghai, Hangzhou, Chengdu and Nanjing had attracted the most interest on its two websites, Trip.com and Ctrip.
During the 30-minute window before midnight, combined data from both sites showed an average query increase of 521 per cent for flights from Hong Kong to the mainland compared with the week before.
Breaking down the data by destination, queries for flights from Hong Kong to Shanghai increased by 1,039 per cent, while searches for trips to Beijing and Hangzhou respectively rose by 718 per cent and 662 per cent.
“We are optimistic about the tourism outlook,” the travel agency said in a statement.
Data from Ctrip also showed a surge in searches among mainland users interested in outbound flights, with the top 10 destinations comprising Macau, Hong Kong, Japan, Thailand, South Korea, the United States, Singapore, Malaysia, Australia and the United Kingdom.
A check by Post also found that six flights were expected to depart Hong Kong on Tuesday for the mainland. Seven were due to leave each day on Wednesday and Thursday, before increasing to nine on Friday.
