China braces for peak air travel as Spring Festival rush starts

China's 2026 Spring Festival travel rush, or chunyun, began Monday, with the civil aviation sector bracing for sustained high demand driven by the longest Spring Festival holiday on record.

The Civil Aviation Administration of China said about 19,080 flights were expected nationwide on the first day, carrying an estimated 2.19 million passenger trips. Major airports including Guangzhou Baiyun, Shanghai Pudong, Shenzhen Bao'an, Beijing Capital and Chengdu Tianfu are seeing the heaviest traffic, with strong demand on routes linking Shanghai, Hangzhou, Guangzhou, Shenzhen and Beijing.

According to CAAC, this year's nine-day Spring Festival holiday is expected to significantly boost long-distance travel, extending the pre-holiday peak and lifting daily flight volumes. In the week before the Spring Festival, daily flights could approach 20,000. During the holiday period — excluding Chinese New Year's Eve and the first day — daily flights are forecast to average about 19,500, roughly 1,000 more than last year.

Over the entire 40-day travel rush from Feb 2 to March 13, China's civil aviation sector is expected to handle about 95 million passenger trips, with an average of 19,400 flights and 2.38 million passenger trips per day.

Major carriers have expanded capacity to meet surging demand. Air China said it planed to operate more than 70,000 passenger flights during the period, up more than 10 percent year on year, focusing on trunk routes linking major city clusters and popular tourist destinations. The airline has also deployed all nine of its domestically produced C919 aircraft on Spring Festival services.

Air traffic management authorities are stepping up coordination. The North China Air Traffic Management Bureau said Beijing Capital and Daxing airports are expected to handle a combined 88,800 takeoffs and landings during the travel rush, with refined traffic flow management measures in place to improve efficiency during peak hours.

At Beijing Capital International Airport, passenger volumes are projected to reach 7.89 million over the 40-day period, up about 1.5 percent from last year. The airport has adjusted staffing at key passenger service points and strengthened coordination with city transport authorities to ensure smooth air-rail and ground connections, while rolling out targeted services for elderly passengers, children and family groups.

As the travel rush gains momentum, aviation authorities said coordination across airlines, airports and air traffic control systems has been fully activated to manage peak passenger flows. With capacity expanded, procedures refined and key hubs operating at high intensity, China's civil aviation network is set to navigate the Spring Festival travel rush with an emphasis on safety, efficiency and service stability.