Finder’s Finds Canadians Ready To Travel This Summer

As restrictions ease, travel plans are on the rise in Canada, with 22% of Canadian adults planning to take at least one trip in the next three months, up from 17% a month ago, according to Finder’s Travel Index.

In fact, in the past five months the appetite for travel by Canadians has been inching higher with Finder’s February and March Travel Index reporting that roughly 13% of Canadians planned to travel in the coming three months.

By May, that number rose to around 17% and now sits at 22% following the June survey.

Canadians are most interested in travelling domestically, with 15% of Canadians planning to travel around Canada over the months of July, August, and September.

And that’s the highest percentage of Canadians interested in domestic travel since Finder first surveyed people in February and higher than the overall percentage of people interested in short term travel — both domestic and international — just three months ago.

International travel plans are also on the rise, with 9% of Canadians planning to travel out of the country over the coming three months, up from 6% in the May survey.

All this activity means interest in travel is now higher in Canada than countries like Australia (18%) and Singapore (20%), but still lower than countries like Ireland 35%, the US (30%), and the UK (26%).

Commenting on the dramatic shift in Canadian attitudes around travel, Finder’s Nicole McKnight observed: “Just a few short months ago Canadians were pessimistic about the pandemic, with vaccine supply issues and the third wave at its worst but now Canada has one of the highest global vaccination rates (for first jabs) and the global travel index illustrates Canadians are looking to make travel plans as soon as this summer as restrictions ease. However, even with promising vaccination rates, there is still a higher percentage of the population planning to travel in countries like the UK and the US where restrictions were loosened sooner, allowing travel between countries sooner as well.”

McKnight continued: “As things currently stand, the government has just eased restrictions around travel, eliminating the need for fully vaccinated Canadians to quarantine when arriving back in Canada and revealing some details about vaccine passports.”

And while she noted that there are still some unknowns, McKnight said that: “this week’s travel news from the government gives the first glimmer of hope for globe-trotting Canadians in more than a year.”

Said McKnight: “Finder.com is seeing traffic increases of 61% to our core travel pages this past month, which shows Canadians are not just researching their next vacation but moving to the booking stage. An interesting trend we are noticing on the site is that Canadians seem to be showing strong interest in music festivals (EDM in particular), and also travelling to countries like Spain and the U.K.”

Finder’s Travel Index is an ongoing survey, which has so far gathered responses from 135,929 people.

For the full report, go to https://www.finder.com/ca/finders-travel-index