Cross-border traffic between the United States and Canada is starting to show some modest improvement. Statistics Canada reported earlier this month that Canadian-resident return trips from the United States in May totaled 1.9 million, up 9.5% from the same month in 2025. This marks the second month of year-over-year increases since December 2024.
Local and travel media are responding with headlines that range from “Travel is rebounding” to “Are Canadians tired of the boycott?” (Referring to the decline in traffic due to President Donald Trump’s trade war and branding of the country as the 51st state.)
However, the increase in travel is not as positive as it seems, cautions Barbara Barrett, Executive Director of Canada’s Frontier Duty Free Association.
Speaking with TMI, Barrett explains:
“We’re certainly encouraged to see cross-border traffic moving in that direction, because we do believe that things will eventually go back to normal. But we’re not at normal yet. The data show that there’s an increase around 9.5%, but the decline last year was somewhere near 35%, so it’s a very small increase. We need to understand this context.”
In fact, according to Statistics Canada, cross-border traffic in May 2026 is down by 28.7% compared with the base year of May 2024, driven by fewer trips by automobile (-28.7% from May 2024) and by air (-28.4% from May 2024).
Furthermore, Barrett says that the increased traffic has not yet translated into more duty free sales in the land border stores.
“The first long weekend of the summer season for Canadians is Victoria Day weekend in May, which is usually a weathervane for how the season is going to go. If there was an increase in travel, it was not yet reflected in the stores.”
Hopefully the increased traffic is the start of a lasting recovery trend, especially since more Americas are traveling to Canada as well. The number of U.S. residents visiting Canada by automobile increased 12.7% in May 2026 from the same month in 2025. Arrivals by air increased 3.8%.
International arrivals also increased, reports Statistics Canada. In May, the preliminary number of international arrivals to Canada (Canadian-resident return trips, combined with US-resident and overseas-resident arrivals) by air and automobile totaled 5.2 million, up 7.6% from the same month in 2025. May 2026 marked the second year-over-year increase in international arrivals since January 2025.
