In 2023, the most visited city in the United States by international tourists was ********, attracting just under **** million visitors. ********************* followed in the ranking, with roughly *** million and *** million international visitors, respectively.

This statistic shows the leading city destinations in the United States in 2019, by number of international arrivals. New York was the leading city destination in the U.S. in terms of international arrivals with approximately ** million visitors from foreign countries in 2019.

The city park with the highest annual visitation in 2023 was Central Park in New York, accounting for a total of ********** visitors. The second most visited city park in that year was Golden Gate Park in San Francisco, with nearly half the visitation of Central Park, at **********.

This statistic shows the most popular United States cities for summer travel in 2016. During the survey, ** percent of the respondents stated that they planned to visit New York for their summer city trip in 2016, making it the most popular city trip destination.

The Mexican city of Cancún was the top Latin American destination for foreign visitors in 2018, with approximately **** million international tourist arrivals. This number was expected to increase by *** percent in 2019, reaching **** million foreign arrivals that year. Argentina's capital, Buenos Aires, ranked second on the list of top city destinations for international tourism in Latin America, with nearly *** million international tourist arrivals in 2018 and an estimate of **** million arrivals for 2019. During the depicted period, the most visited city in the whole American continent was New York.

This table contains 45 series, with data for years 2014 - 2014 (not all combinations necessarily have data for all years). This table contains data described by the following dimensions (Not all combinations are available): Geography (1 item: Canada) State visited (15 items: Florida; New York; Washington; California; ...) Travel characteristics (3 items: Visits; Nights; Spending in country).

In the fourth quarter of 2024, San Francisco was the most popular city among millennials in the United States, with ** percent saying they liked the city. Meanwhile, San Diego was the most popular among Generation X, and Nashville among Baby Boomers.

This statistic shows the most popular domestic summer city destinations for travelers in the United States in 2015, according to travel agent members of the ASTA Research Family. During the survey, 17 percent of the respondents forecasted that Orlando would be a popular domestic city destination for U.S. travelers in summer 2015.

Convention and visitor bureaus enjoyed a sharp uptick in national travel, stronger travel expenditure growth among businesses and individuals and consistent interest in conference planning and booking needs. Despite initial volatility amid pandemic-era lockdowns in 2020 that heavily constrained travel, the reopening of major tourist destinations, such as Las Vegas and New York City, prompted a sharp incline in domestic travel. Continued expansion of consumer spending, coupled with higher business propensity in setting up in-person conferences resulted in a sharp 127.9% acceleration of inbound international travelers. These tourists and business conference attendees required information on public accommodations, tourist attractions and city sights, resulting in considerable demand spikes for bureaus. While elevated interest rates continue to pose a potential issue in higher travel spending, resilient consumer spending and growth in core leisure and business expenditures boosted bureau services demand. Revenue accelerated at a CAGR of 9.1% to an estimated $3.7 billion over the past five years, including an expected 1.6% boost in 2025 alone. Profit also expanded to 9.4% in 2025, buoyed by greater implementation of digital tools for bookings and travel plans. Conference and visitor bureaus were heavily impacted by the incline in technological usage across the travel space. More individuals and businesses have begun using digital tools, such as smartphones and contactless check-ins, to help book trips and source information on their travel destination, encouraging incumbent bureaus to develop more in-house digital tools that could assist with sourcing information and promoting local municipalities. Online travel sites continue to make up the bulk of competitive threats, as they enable individuals to compare fares and directly book trips online instead of using visitor bureaus. Nonetheless, bureaus remain highly popular among conference planners, strengthening the industry’s profitability even amid digital competition. Moving forward, convention and visitor bureaus are poised to benefit from continued incline in consumer spending and stable travel trends. Higher expenditures on business conferences, particularly among larger corporate clients, will provide a lucrative revenue niche for bureaus in corporate-heavy areas like New York City. Technological proliferation will continue to change how bookings and travel plans are conducted, forcing higher investment in digital technology to maintain market relevance. Finally, robust international events such as the 2026 FIFA World Cup and 2028 Summer Olympics will provide key regional tourism and travel accelerants. Revenue is expected to grow at a CAGR of 1.8% to an estimated $4.1 billion over the next five years.

City Pass Market Outlook

According to our latest research, the global City Pass market size reached USD 1.82 billion in 2024, reflecting robust demand across major urban destinations worldwide. The market is projected to expand at a CAGR of 9.6% from 2025 to 2033, with the total market value expected to reach USD 4.16 billion by 2033. This growth trajectory is fueled by increasing urban tourism, evolving travel preferences, and the digital transformation of ticketing solutions, making city passes a preferred choice among diverse traveler segments.

One of the primary growth drivers for the City Pass market is the surge in urban tourism, which has become a significant trend in the global travel industry. As cities continue to position themselves as vibrant cultural, historical, and entertainment hubs, tourists are increasingly seeking efficient, cost-effective ways to explore multiple attractions. City passes offer bundled access to a range of sites, museums, and experiences, often at a discounted rate compared to individual tickets. This value proposition, combined with the convenience of digital or contactless options, appeals to both international and domestic travelers. Additionally, the rise of experiential travel, where tourists prioritize immersive and varied activities, further propels the adoption of city passes. This trend is particularly pronounced among millennials and Gen Z travelers, who are tech-savvy and value seamless, integrated travel solutions.

The proliferation of digital platforms and mobile applications has also played a crucial role in the expansion of the City Pass market. Online sales channels have made it easier for consumers to research, purchase, and activate city passes, often with real-time updates and personalized recommendations. The integration of city passes with other digital services, such as navigation apps, itinerary planners, and loyalty programs, adds another layer of convenience and customization. Furthermore, partnerships between city pass providers and local businesses, transportation networks, and event organizers enhance the overall value proposition, making these passes more attractive to a broader audience. The COVID-19 pandemic accelerated the shift towards contactless and mobile-first solutions, a trend that continues to shape the market’s evolution.

Another key factor contributing to the market’s growth is the increasing adoption of city passes by local residents and business travelers, in addition to tourists. Municipal governments and tourism boards are leveraging city passes as tools for promoting local attractions, supporting cultural institutions, and stimulating economic activity within urban centers. Special offers for residents, students, or corporate groups are becoming more common, expanding the market beyond traditional tourists. As cities compete to attract both visitors and new residents, the ability to showcase a diverse range of experiences through a single, easy-to-use pass becomes a strategic advantage. This diversification of the target audience is expected to sustain market growth over the forecast period.

Regionally, Europe continues to dominate the City Pass market, accounting for the largest share in 2024, followed closely by North America and the Asia Pacific. European cities, with their dense concentration of historical and cultural attractions, have long been pioneers in the adoption of city pass systems. However, rapid urbanization, growing middle-class populations, and increased investment in tourism infrastructure are driving significant growth in Asia Pacific markets as well. North America, particularly the United States and Canada, remains a key market due to high inbound tourism and the popularity of city-based sightseeing. Latin America and the Middle East & Africa are emerging as promising regions, supported by government initiatives and expanding travel networks.

Product Type Analysis

The City Pass market is segmented by product type into Single-City Pass, Multi-City Pass, and Attraction-Specific Pass. Single-City Passes remain the most popular product category, catering to travelers who focus their visits on one urban destination and wish to maximize their experience within a limited timeframe. These passes typically bundle access to a curated list of top attractions, museums, and public transportation, providing substantial savings and convenience. The success of single-city passes is closely linked to the strength of a city’s tour

In 2025, San Miguel de Allende in Mexico was named the top destination in Latin America by travelers, receiving a score of 93.33. The Mexican capital followed in second place with a score of nearly 91 points.

Las Vegas, New York, Washington, Chicago, Toronto, Los Angeles, Denver, San Francisco, Honolulu, Orlando, Cincinnati, Phoenix, Houston, Philadelphia, Atlanta, Boston, Dallas, Minneapolis, Seattle, Cleveland

The data has been generated by ethnographic observations, interviews and interactions with migrant workers in two sites in Shanghai in 2017/2018: Songjiang District on the south-western outskirts, and the inner-city Huangpu District, in proximity to some of the city’s most famous tourist attractions, such as the Bund or Nanjing Road. Ethnography, with its focus on everyday experience, can yield significant insights into understanding migrant mental health in contexts where signs of severe mental distress remain largely imperceptible, and more generally, into how stresses and strains are lived through the spaces, times and affective atmospheres of the city. Migrant ethnography can help us reconsider the oft-made connection between everyday stress and mental ill health. In this research, drawing on field evidence in central and peripheral Shanghai, we highlight the importance of attending to the forms of spatial and temporal agency through which migrants actively manage the ways in which the city affects their subjectivity. These everyday subjective practices serve to problematize the very concept of ‘mental health’, enabling us to engage in a critical dialogue with sociological and epidemiological research that assesses migrant mental health states through the lens of the vulnerability or resilience of this social group, often reducing citiness to a series of environmental ‘stressors’.

We have known, since at least the early twentieth century, that there is an association between living in a city and being diagnosed with a mental illness. But questions around the specificity of relationship between urban life and have continued well into the twenty-first century. We still don't know, for example, exactly why mental illness clusters in cities; we don't know how it relates to experiences of urban poverty, deprivation, overcrowding, social exclusion, and racism; and we don't know the precise biological and sociological mechanisms that turn difficult urban lives into diagnosable mental health conditions. What we do know is that migrants into cities bear a disproportionately large share of the burden of urban mental illness; we know that dense living conditions seem to exacerbate the problem; and we know that the general stress, tumult and precarity of urban living can, sometimes, create the basis for the development of clinical problems. If there are unanswered questions around the relationship between mental health and the city, these questions are particularly acute in contemporary China: China has urbanised at an unprecedented rate in the last decade, and has now become a majority urban society. But whereas in nineteenth-century Europe urbanization came from a growth in population, in twenty-first century China the situation is different: most of the growth is from rural migrants coming into the cities. In China, then, the link between urban transformation and mental illness is a critical issue: (1) Development in China is related to migration from the countryside into the cities; (2) Unrecognized and untreated mental disorder is a key factor in casting individuals and families into poverty and social exclusion; (3) Effective development of urban mental health policu requires far greater understanding of the related problems of urban stress, precarious living conditions and mental disorder. This project is an attempt to understand the relationship between migration and mental health in one Chinese mega-city: Shanghai. Given what we know about the relationship between urban mental health and particular patterns of social life (poverty, migration, dense housing, and so on), it starts from the position that this question requires new input from the social sciences. At the heart of the project is an attempt to mix what we know about mental health in contemporary Shanghai with a new kind of close-up, street-level data on what the daily experience of being a migrant on Shanghai is actually life - especially with regard to stress, housing, and access to services. We will then connect these two forms of knowledge to produce a new kind of survey for getting a new sociological deep surveying instrument for mapping migrant mental health in Shanghai. The project, which is split between researchers in the UK and China, asks: (1) How is mental disorder actually patterned in Shanghai, and how is that pattern affected by recent migration? (2) How are immigrants absorbed in Shanghai, and what is daily life actually like in Shanghai's migrant communities? (3) What policies, services, or laws might alleviate mental health among migrants in Shanghai? (4) What can be learned in Shanghai for similar problems in other developing mega-cities (such as Sao Paolo or Lagos). This project should also us to also produce new data on two of the major research-areas that are prioritised under this join UK-China research-scheme: 'Migration and public services,' where we will look at the relationship between the welfare system and migration, and analyse the services that currently help to alleviate this problem, as well as migrants' access to those services; (2) 'Inequalities and everyday life,' where we will develop a close-up, street-level analysis of the lived inequalities of everyday migrant life in Shanghai, and try to understand how urban inequality might contribute to the development of mental health problems?

This data set includes cities in the United States, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. These cities were collected from the 1970 National Atlas of the United States. Where applicable, U.S. Census Bureau codes for named populated places were associated with each name to allow additional information to be attached. The Geographic Names Information System (GNIS) was also used as a source for additional information. This is a revised version of the December, 2003, data set.

This layer is sourced from maps.bts.dot.gov.

As of January 2025, the top domestic vacation destinations among respondents in the United States were New York City, Las Vegas, and Hawaii, each selected by ** percent of participants. Looking at generational preferences, New York City was the most favored destination among Gen Z, with ** percent saying they would consider visiting in the next *** to three years, compared to just ** percent of baby boomers.

Digital Twin for Destinations Market Outlook

According to our latest research, the global Digital Twin for Destinations market size in 2024 stands at USD 2.39 billion, reflecting the rapid adoption of digital transformation initiatives across the tourism, urban planning, and smart city sectors. The market is anticipated to exhibit a robust CAGR of 32.4% from 2025 to 2033, reaching a projected value of USD 23.78 billion by 2033. This impressive growth trajectory is primarily driven by increasing investments in smart infrastructure, the rising demand for immersive and data-driven tourism experiences, and the growing emphasis on sustainable urban development worldwide.

One of the primary growth factors for the Digital Twin for Destinations market is the surging need for advanced urban planning and management tools. As cities worldwide face the dual challenges of rapid urbanization and climate change, stakeholders are increasingly turning to digital twin technology to simulate, visualize, and optimize urban environments. By integrating real-time data from IoT sensors, GIS, and other sources, digital twins enable city planners and government agencies to make informed decisions regarding transportation, infrastructure, and resource allocation. This not only enhances operational efficiency but also supports the creation of resilient, sustainable urban ecosystems. The proliferation of smart city initiatives, particularly in developed regions such as North America and Europe, is significantly accelerating the adoption of digital twin solutions for destination management.

Another significant driver is the transformation of the global tourism industry through digital innovation. Tourism boards, hospitality groups, and destination management organizations are leveraging digital twins to create virtual replicas of landmarks, cities, and natural attractions. These virtual environments allow stakeholders to offer immersive experiences to potential visitors, facilitate crowd management, and optimize tourist flows. Additionally, digital twins enable real-time monitoring of tourist hotspots, helping authorities ensure visitor safety, preserve heritage sites, and enhance the overall visitor experience. The COVID-19 pandemic has further underscored the importance of digital engagement, prompting accelerated investment in digital twin platforms to support virtual tourism and remote exploration.

Furthermore, the integration of digital twin technology with environmental monitoring and sustainability initiatives is catalyzing market expansion. Governments and environmental agencies are utilizing digital twins to track air and water quality, monitor ecosystem health, and simulate the impact of urban development on natural resources. This holistic approach allows for proactive risk management and supports compliance with environmental regulations. The convergence of digital twin platforms with AI, machine learning, and big data analytics is unlocking new avenues for predictive modeling and scenario analysis, enabling stakeholders to anticipate challenges and implement effective mitigation strategies. As sustainability becomes a central tenet of urban and tourism policy, the demand for digital twin solutions is poised for sustained growth.

The concept of a Smart City Digital Twin is gaining traction as urban areas strive to enhance their infrastructure and services through digital innovation. By creating a virtual replica of a city, stakeholders can simulate various scenarios and assess the impact of different urban planning decisions. This technology enables city planners to optimize traffic management, improve public transportation systems, and enhance energy efficiency. Moreover, Smart City Digital Twins facilitate better resource allocation and emergency response planning, making cities more resilient to challenges such as climate change and population growth. As cities continue to evolve, the integration of digital twins will be pivotal in ensuring sustainable and efficient urban development.

Regionally, North America currently dominates the Digital Twin for Destinations market, accounting for the largest revenue share in 2024, followed closely by Europe and the Asia Pacific. The United States, Canada, Germany, the United Kingdom, and China are at the forefront of digital twin adoption, driven by robust technological infrastructure, supportive government polic

Notice: this is not the latest Heat Island Severity image service. For 2023 data, visit https://tpl.maps.arcgis.com/home/item.html?id=db5bdb0f0c8c4b85b8270ec67448a0b6. This layer contains the relative heat severity for every pixel for every city in the United States. This 30-meter raster was derived from Landsat 8 imagery band 10 (ground-level thermal sensor) from the summers of 2018 and 2019.Federal statistics over a 30-year period show extreme heat is the leading cause of weather-related deaths in the United States. Extreme heat exacerbated by urban heat islands can lead to increased respiratory difficulties, heat exhaustion, and heat stroke. These heat impacts significantly affect the most vulnerable—children, the elderly, and those with preexisting conditions.The purpose of this layer is to show where certain areas of cities are hotter than the average temperature for that same city as a whole. Severity is measured on a scale of 1 to 5, with 1 being a relatively mild heat area (slightly above the mean for the city), and 5 being a severe heat area (significantly above the mean for the city). The absolute heat above mean values are classified into these 5 classes using the Jenks Natural Breaks classification method, which seeks to reduce the variance within classes and maximize the variance between classes. Knowing where areas of high heat are located can help a city government plan for mitigation strategies.This dataset represents a snapshot in time. It will be updated yearly, but is static between updates. It does not take into account changes in heat during a single day, for example, from building shadows moving. The thermal readings detected by the Landsat 8 sensor are surface-level, whether that surface is the ground or the top of a building. Although there is strong correlation between surface temperature and air temperature, they are not the same. We believe that this is useful at the national level, and for cities that don’t have the ability to conduct their own hyper local temperature survey. Where local data is available, it may be more accurate than this dataset. Dataset SummaryThis dataset was developed using proprietary Python code developed at The Trust for Public Land, running on the Descartes Labs platform through the Descartes Labs API for Python. The Descartes Labs platform allows for extremely fast retrieval and processing of imagery, which makes it possible to produce heat island data for all cities in the United States in a relatively short amount of time.What can you do with this layer?This layer has query, identify, and export image services available. Since it is served as an image service, it is not necessary to download the data; the service itself is data that can be used directly in any Esri geoprocessing tool that accepts raster data as input.Using the Urban Heat Island (UHI) Image ServicesThe data is made available as an image service. There is a processing template applied that supplies the yellow-to-red or blue-to-red color ramp, but once this processing template is removed (you can do this in ArcGIS Pro or ArcGIS Desktop, or in QGIS), the actual data values come through the service and can be used directly in a geoprocessing tool (for example, to extract an area of interest). Following are instructions for doing this in Pro.In ArcGIS Pro, in a Map view, in the Catalog window, click on Portal. In the Portal window, click on the far-right icon representing Living Atlas. Search on the acronyms “tpl” and “uhi”. The results returned will be the UHI image services. Right click on a result and select “Add to current map” from the context menu. When the image service is added to the map, right-click on it in the map view, and select Properties. In the Properties window, select Processing Templates. On the drop-down menu at the top of the window, the default Processing Template is either a yellow-to-red ramp or a blue-to-red ramp. Click the drop-down, and select “None”, then “OK”. Now you will have the actual pixel values displayed in the map, and available to any geoprocessing tool that takes a raster as input. Below is a screenshot of ArcGIS Pro with a UHI image service loaded, color ramp removed, and symbology changed back to a yellow-to-red ramp (a classified renderer can also be used): Other Sources of Heat Island InformationPlease see these websites for valuable information on heat islands and to learn about exciting new heat island research being led by scientists across the country:EPA’s Heat Island Resource CenterDr. Ladd Keith, University of Arizona Dr. Ben McMahan, University of Arizona Dr. Jeremy Hoffman, Science Museum of Virginia Dr. Hunter Jones, NOAADaphne Lundi, Senior Policy Advisor, NYC Mayor's Office of Recovery and ResiliencyDisclaimer/FeedbackWith nearly 14,000 cities represented, checking each city's heat island raster for quality assurance would be prohibitively time-consuming, so The Trust for Public Land checked a statistically significant sample size for data quality. The sample passed all quality checks, with about 98.5% of the output cities error-free, but there could be instances where the user finds errors in the data. These errors will most likely take the form of a line of discontinuity where there is no city boundary; this type of error is caused by large temperature differences in two adjacent Landsat scenes, so the discontinuity occurs along scene boundaries (see figure below). The Trust for Public Land would appreciate feedback on these errors so that version 2 of the national UHI dataset can be improved. Contact Dale.Watt@tpl.org with feedback.

In 2023, the most visited state in the United States by international tourists was New York, attracting just over nine million visitors. Florida and California followed in the ranking, with almost eight million and slightly under 6.3 million international visitors, respectively.

This statistic shows the most visited tourist attractions worldwide as of April 2014. Each year, 22.5 million people visit Niagara Falls.

Most visited tourist attractions - additional information

Attracting just short of 40 million visitors per year, the Las Vegas Strip was the most visited tourist attraction in the world as of April 2014, closely followed by Times Square in New York City with 39.2 million. The top nine tourist attractions, and 28 out of the top 50, were located in the United States. With so much to see and do in their own country, it is not surprising that many U.S. travelers choose to take domestic trips over international ones – in 2014, 84 percent of people taking trips were traveling domestically, compared to just 16 percent traveling abroad.

The Las Vegas Strip, situated in Las Vegas in the state of Nevada, is well-known for its gambling and casino scene, nightlife, restaurants and shopping. The city is packed with resorts offering a variety of entertainment for visitors. Nevada’s most famous industry, casino gaming, was expected to generate around 13 billion U.S. dollars in 2015. Las Vegas is also a leader in the U.S. meetings and conventions industry, hosting more than 22 thousand conventions in 2013.

Outside of the U.S., the most visited tourist attraction was the Forbidden City in Beijing, receiving more than 15 million visitors annually. Built in the early fifteenth century, the Forbidden City was home to Emperors and the center of Chinese government from the Ming dynasty until the end of the Qing dynasty in 1912. The most visited tourist attraction in Europe was the Grand Bazaar in Istanbul, Turkey. The ancient market received 15 million visitors in 2014, although only ranked 11th worldwide.

The number of international tourist arrivals to the selected European destinations increased in 2024 over the previous year, in most cases surpassing pre-pandemic levels. In 2024, Paris and the Île-de-France region recorded the highest figure among the selected destinations, with **** million inbound tourist arrivals. London and Istanbul followed in the ranking that year, with roughly ** million and **** million arrivals, respectively. What are the most visited countries by international tourists? Both before and after the COVID-19 pandemic, France was the country with the highest number of inbound tourist arrivals worldwide. Meanwhile, the United States consistently ranks as the country with the highest international tourism receipts worldwide. How many tourists travel every year? In 2024, the number of international tourist arrivals worldwide exceeded *** billion, catching up with pre-pandemic levels. Breaking down the number of inbound tourist arrivals worldwide by region shows that Europe is the global leading destination for inbound tourism, with over *** million international tourist arrivals in 2024.