Summary
- Foreign tourism to the US fell by 4 million visitors in 2025, costing the economy more than $8 billion.
- Presidential rhetoric and policy confusion drove the steepest decline in two decades outside of the pandemic.
- Experts warn the drop weakens America’s soft power as the world absorbs a narrative of dysfunction rather than democratic leadership.
AI-generated summary was reviewed by a CNN editor.
There’s no sugarcoating it. The complete 2025 data is in, and the message is clear: International visitors stayed away from the US in the first real year-over-year decline since the Covid-19 pandemic. The drop in visitors was larger than during the global recession of 2008.
This time, it wasn’t a pandemic or a collapse of the market — it was human error. Travelers cite presidential rhetoric and policies manifesting in highly public wars — both figurative and literal — as some of the reasons for staying away.
Four million fewer foreign visitors came to the US in 2025 compared to 2024, with total spending decreasing by more than $8 billion.
That’s not just bad for those working in the service and tourism industries. The impact of a self-inflicted decrease in international visitors of this magnitude has implications on America’s standing in the world, its soft power diplomacy and the economy as a whole.
CNN first reported worrying trends last August that have manifested in a 5.5% drop in international tourism in 2025. It’s the worst single-year decline in two decades, with the exception of the 2020 pandemic.
“We used to be a country that others wanted to emulate. That narrative no longer exists,” said Juliette Kayyem, faculty chair of the Homeland Security Project at the Harvard Kennedy School and CNN senior national security analyst.
Kayyem explained that “soft power,” where America’s strength is reflected in more than its military powers, is weakening with a filtered story being told to those outside the country: “If you’re a foreigner now, what you’re absorbing about the United States is a dysfunctional government, ICE raids, Americans being killed, crime everywhere.”
With significantly fewer people coming here, she said, “the long-term harm is that the world will not know America … the narrative of the United States is now a country that is at best, not to be respected, and at worst, a democracy that is floundering.”
Perceptions aside, there are recent practical barriers of visiting too: hesitation around a proposed $250 visa integrity fee, war-induced spikes in jet fuel prices, and the defunding of Brand USA — the only American organization that markets US tourism to international audiences. (Bills were introduced in the House and Senate to restore funding but neither has moved forward.)
Adam Sacks, president of Tourism Economics, a travel data analytics company, said proposing extra fees to visit the US and tariff wars are examples of “pennywise and pound foolish” policies that seem to bring in more money in principle but end up costing the US much more.
This action from Washington has caused enough confusion, or even ill will, that Brand USA recently launched a campaign to “build traveler confidence” and clear up misinformation, including clarifying that the visa integrity fee is not yet being collected, and that a Trump administration proposal to collect five years of social media history from certain visitors is not current policy.
Department of Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin has also publicly floated an idea to restrict customs processing operations at airports in sanctuary cities. But the administration has so far not moved forward with it.
Those who did visit the US in 2025 spent more per person. But because of the significant decline in visitor numbers, the total spending was $8.4 billion less (adjusted for inflation and exchange rates), compared to the year before, according to the World Travel and Tourism Council. Tourism Economics estimates that the loss is even worse (up to $25 billion less) when comparing with what was forecasted to have been spent in the US, had tourism stayed on its expected growth track.
And the United States’ downturn is an outlier. Eighty million more people travelled internationally in 2025 compared with the year before, “yet they chose other destinations,” wrote the World Travel and Tourism Council in its April press release.
While there were noticeable drops in visitors from Germany, India, France, Chile, Australia and China, for example, the vast majority of the drop in visitors was due to Canadians not crossing the border. There were some increases in foreign visitors too, particularly from Mexico, by an additional 1 million people in 2025 over 2024.
John Stewart of Golden Lake, Ontario, was supposed to be at the Indy 500 this Memorial Day weekend. But not this year.
Every spring for about 35 years, he has traveled to Indianapolis to meet up with his American relatives, enjoy the lead-up of race morning, soak in the pomp and circumstance, and talk to people with a beer in hand. He’s been known to easily spend $10,000 on these annual weeklong trips.
But Stewart said he has reached an “ideological breakpoint.”
Unlike some Canadians who have already been boycotting all things USA, Stewart had not wanted to hurt regular American jobs, when it’s the man in charge he takes issue with.
But recent conversations with Trump-supporting American colleagues are ultimately what made him think twice about spending vacation time arguing with people in the US: “I just don’t want to put myself in that position on a holiday where I know I’m going to be normally just having beers and watching racing… I just think I wouldn’t enjoy some of the conversations,” he said.
While Trump’s chaotic salvo of tariffs levied on Canada and his rhetoric of calling for Canada to become the 51st state were bothersome, it has been the launch of the war in Iran that put Stewart over the edge.
“It’s really not Canadian [versus] American, it’s just what’s right and wrong,” he said. For now, he’s pausing all personal trips to the US.
Recent analysis of cell phone activity by Cuebiq shows as much as a 42% drop in the past year in Canadian visits to US metropolitan areas, a significantly higher number than the official 25% drop in estimated border crossings.
Joe Koenen, who runs Seattle Free Walking Tours, feels this acutely. CNN talked to him last summer when he saw Canadians disappear from Seattle.
Koenen said things are even tougher this year. He’s put more money into marketing and online advertising than ever, but the bookings are still down from last year.
CNN had also spoken to Adam Duford last year, who runs Surf City Tours in Santa Monica, California. He says “Canadian spring break” simply didn’t happen in 2025.
Duford does see more international tourists trickling back this year, but it’s too late. In October, Duford had to let go of all seven of his employees.
“It was terrible,” Duford said. “They were so surprised and taken off guard. I was surprised they were surprised, so that made it almost worse.”
Duford first took over the tour company in 2019, thinking, “I guess sunshine and tourism in Santa Monica, California, it was never going to go away. That’s a pretty good investment.”
He not only faced a pandemic shutdown, but also battled misinformation about where the 2025 Los Angeles fires had spread. He said people also mistakenly believed that protests over ICE presence had spread through the whole city (when it was mainly downtown), a notion which kept some people away last year.
In the end, his 2025 revenue was less than half of what it was in years before.
Duford is now running one tour bus to Malibu by himself, while starting another business called Santa Monica Surf Tours, where he guides people on the water in different surf spots and sets up beach lunches for them. Duford is still trying to pay off a Covid-era loan for his first business.
Duford needs about two guests per day to break even, which he thinks is feasible, given that he’s seen more international customers this year so far.
Another warm vacation spot, Florida, experienced the brunt of overall loss in international tourists, Sacks said. The Sunshine State is a favorite destination for snowbirds avoiding harsh winters.
Walt Disney World, in central Florida, for example, sees a large swath of international guests each year, and even some diehard fans from abroad have hesitated to return to that tourism behemoth.
During Disney’s latest quarterly earnings call, executives reported that domestic theme park attendance dropped 1% compared to the same quarter last year, “reflecting, in part, continued softness in international visitation.” Disney’s domestic hotel occupancy was also down from 92% a year ago to 89% in the company’s second quarter of 2026, which ended on March 28.
The report also noted that these same pressures were already present in the same quarter last year, creating a lower comparison base.
Canadian travel to the US may now be entering a rebound phase with visits by car increasing 5.8% in April compared to the same month last year — the first month showing an increase in more than a year. Visits by air are still down, according to Statistics Canada.
But recovery may be slow. People like Ray Caesar, of Toronto, aren’t returning anytime soon.
“Canada is not a subordinate state or a vassal of the United States,” Caesar wrote to CNN in an email. “Threats about ‘destroying’ our economy or diminishing our sovereignty strike many Canadians as profoundly disrespectful toward a country that has historically been one of America’s closest allies, most stable neighbours, and most dependable trading partners.”
Caesar and his wife, Jane Nagai, recently spent tens of thousands of dollars on a trip to Japan, instead of taking a trip to New York. He said they have plans to go back to Japan and will also be going to Vienna and Italy in the near future.
“The reality is that there are many extraordinary places in the world to visit, and for us, the United States is simply no longer one of them. We have largely made peace with the idea that we may never return.”
He’s not frustrated with Americans themselves — but is disappointed with the people who have enabled this political direction or failed to resist it.
Canadians aren’t alone in these feelings; other would-be foreign visitors have balked at the talk over the US annexing Greenland, questioning the NATO alliance, and the handling of tariffs or wars.
Sadness is the overwhelming reaction for Karin Williams, as she visits Massachusetts this month without the large, extended family that was supposed to be going with her.
Williams, a dual citizen of the United States and Sweden, came to the US to see her son graduate from college. But she’s there with only her husband and not the six other relatives from Scandinavia, who spent years saving up for this trip.
Instead, the extended family canceled after seeing how federal agents interacted with immigrants and US citizens in Minneapolis.
Williams, who is chair of the Democrats Abroad Skåne (a region in Sweden) chapter, said she did not try to persuade her relatives to change their minds.
“It’s just sad to see a country with such potential, sort of being blundered in some way,” she said, noting that it’s many actions that add up. “Between the ‘Bunker Ballroom’ and ripping down the pool and putting his likeness up on buildings,” Williams said Trump’s actions are disturbing for Europeans who still live with the memories of World War II.
Sacks said that overseas travel to the US (which excludes trips from Canada and Mexico) is “down another 4.3% through April. And while we still expect the beginnings of recovery in the second half of the year, it won’t offset the substantial losses we’ve experienced over the past year.”
The slower-than-expected recovery has to do with the war in Iran.
Sentiments about the US and high jet fuel prices aside, simply flying from India to the US now, for example, has been significantly hampered by restricted air space in the Middle East. Visitor numbers from India are expected to dip more than 4% this year compared to last year.
The World Travel and Tourism Council says the US is “at a crossroads.”
There is a “significant opportunity to restore international visitor spending,” particularly as competition intensifies from countries in Asia, the organization states.
But the question is whether US leaders will seize that opportunity.
“A big policy goal right now at the federal level is to improve the US trade balance,” said Sacks. “And the irony here is that historically, the US has had a trade balance in only one significant area, and that is in travel.”
But not in 2025. Americans now spend more traveling abroad than what foreign visitors spend visiting the US.
And the National Travel and Tourism office projects international arrivals to the US won’t exceed pre-pandemic levels until 2029, a full decade later.
The World Cup is one bright spot. Games are supposed to bring about 1 million visitors to the US this year, Sacks said, so the benefit to host cities will be substantial, though hotel block sales aren’t as robust as those cities had hoped.
Sacks said FIFA had anticipated 100 Super Bowls’ worth of visitors, but it will turn out to be more like 10 Super Bowls, which won’t be nearly enough to make up for 2025 losses.
Kayyem said she is starting to see more of a counter push in narrative that focuses on bringing people together and embracing diversity, especially at the local level from mayors and governors who will be hosting World Cup games.
“But it’s not going to change easily,” Kayyem said, referring to a perception by the outside world that the US is a divided society at war, instead of a shining beacon of democracy. “You wonder if this is a generational shift.”
To start clawing out of this hole, Sacks said US leaders need to start by fully funding Brand USA, toning down the rhetoric particularly against our allies, and “get[ting] out of our own way.”
“We will make it through this as well,” Sacks said. “It’s just a question of, how long does it take?”
