The Canadian boycott of travel to the US is getting worse

Travel has declined for more than a full year

The Canadian boycott of travel to the United States is still holding firm one year after the first major drop in cross-border travel was registered in the numbers. New data revealed that the trend that US President Donald Trump prompted won’t be letting up anytime soon. 

Trump’s rhetoric started the travel boycott trend

Canadians showed just how enraged they were with the rhetoric coming from President Trump about the plans he had for Canada once he was back in office. Talk of high tariffs led many to begin boycotting American products and leisure travel to the US. 

Things got even worse once Trump was back in office

Once Trump was back in office, he slapped a hefty tariff on Canada, along with a variety of new sectoral tariffs and duties that have hurt the country. The President also began to talk about making Canada the 51st state, which only upset Canadians even more. 

Canadians responded to Trump with boycotts

The response to Trump and the many actions of his second administration has been the near-unanimous rejection of travel south of the border. Last year saw a massive drop in the number of Canadians traveling to the United States, and 2026 may be no different. 

What we know about the massive decline in 2025

While all of the final numbers aren’t in yet, we know that land travel to the United States in 2025 fell by 30.9% in total. That equaled 7.9 million fewer trips south than in 2024, according to data recently relayed to CBC News by Statistics Canada. 

Was Trump responsible for the jaw-dropping slide?

Whether Trump was responsible for the decline was not something that an analyst from Statistics Canada would comment on, but they did say that the travel drop in 2025 was “notable  because of its length and the depth of the decline.”

Not something that we’ve seen before in our history

"It hasn't been too often in our history where we've seen drops of that level, for as long of a period,” Statistics Canada’s Laura Presley told CBC News. Presley went on to also note that land travel had been “pretty consistent” before the 2025 swing. 

How air travel to the United States declined in 2025

Air travel in 2025 fared no better based on the data currently available. According to CBC News, Statistics Canada revealed that between February 2025 and October 2025, air travel to the US declined by 21%. Land travel in that same period had fallen by 33.5%. 

The declines have continued into the new year

The decline in travel from Canada to the United States has been unprecedented since it began, and the latest preliminary data from Statistics Canada on the travel cross-border figures from January 2026 showed that they saw another large year-over-year decline. 

Travel to the United States dropped by a lot

Canadian resident return trips from the United States in January 2026 totaled just 1.6 million, which was down 23.4% from January 2025. 

A sharp decline again

“When comparing the January 2026 number with January 2024, before the start of the trade conflict with the United States in 2025, a sharper decline (-28.2%) was observed,” Statistics Canada noted 

Automobile and air travel returns

“Automobile return trips from the United States were a key contributor to the overall decrease,” Statistics Canada noted in a report on the preliminary data.  Automobile returns fell by 26.8% year over year to a total of 1.1 million, and air travel returns declined by 17.8% year over year to 493,000. 

Canadians just aren’t traveling to the US

While Canadian air travel to the United States may have dropped in January 2026, total overseas return trips from other countries by air totaled 1.4 million, which was an increase of 11.1 million from January 2025, suggesting Canadians are still traveling, just not to the US. 

The twelfth consecutive month of steep declines

“January was the twelfth consecutive month of steep declines in inbound Canadian travel, with double-digit year-over-year drops in both car and air travel to the U.S. every month since April,” Forbes reported about what the new preliminary data from Statistics Canada revealed. 

A major problem for America

The loss of millions of Canadian travelers is a significant problem for the United States since Canadians historically make up the largest majority of foreign travelers to the US. 

Canadian travelers are critical for the US

According to the US Travel Association, in 2024, the United States saw 20.4 million visits from Canadians, which generated $20.5 billion dollars in spending and supported 140,000 American jobs. The association warned in February 2025 that American tariffs on Canada could result in 10% fewer visits, which would be detrimental for the country. 

How a 10% reduction would hurt Americans

“A 10% reduction in Canadian travel could mean 2.0 million fewer visits, $2.1 billion in lost spending and 14,000 job losses,” the US Travel Association warned. Based on the data, this projection was likely far less than the reality of the damage. 

We still don’t know how much money America lost in 2025

Exactly how much money was lost in the last twelve months of year-over-year declines in travel is unclear, but the final numbers will likely come out soon, and then Americans will know exactly how much Trump’s antagonism toward Canada has hurt them when it comes to Canadian travel to the US and the spending that it brought into the country.