Statistics from the Shanghai Airport Immigration Inspection Station show that in the first three days of the National Day holiday, the total number of inbound and outbound travelers at Shanghai Pudong International Airport exceeded 319,000, while inbound and outbound passenger and cargo flights surpassed 2,100.
During the first three days of the National Day holiday, mainland residents entering and exiting through Pudong International Airport reached 220,000, accounting for 69% of total inbound and outbound travelers and forming the main body of airport passenger flow. About two-thirds of outbound mainland residents chose nearby short-haul destinations, with East Asia, Southeast Asia, and Hong Kong, Macao, and Taiwan remaining popular choices. At the same time, driven by a 13-day extended holiday created by bundling leave days, nearly 30% of travelers chose long-haul destinations in Europe, the Americas, Oceania, and Africa.
In response to the high-volume inbound and outbound passenger flow of mainland residents during the holiday period, the Shanghai Airport Immigration Inspection Station continued to optimize its combined "express plus manual" clearance model, strengthened the deployment of guidance staff outside inspection counters in the waiting areas, assigned dedicated personnel on duty, and proactively guided eligible mainland residents to use express channels to achieve "second-level" clearance. For special groups such as the elderly, the weak, the sick, the disabled, and pregnant women, it provided full-process warm assistance, and offered family travelers point-to-point guidance from the waiting line to the inspection counter, enabling centralized processing and one-time completion for family members.
During the National Day holiday, the popularity of foreign nationals coming to Shanghai remained strong. In the first three days of the holiday, foreign nationals entering through Pudong International Airport reached 43,000, an increase of about 23.5% compared with the same period of last year's National Day holiday. In terms of source structure, the number of travelers from South Korea, Russia, and Southeast Asian countries ranked among the highest, with group tours becoming an important component. A top-tier sports event also added momentum to international passenger flow—the 2026 Shanghai Rolex Masters will begin on October 5, with its schedule spanning the National Day Golden Week. Many overseas player teams and tennis fans arrived in Shanghai in advance, and "traveling with the event" is becoming a new reason for foreign travelers to enter the country.
To ensure efficient clearance for inbound foreign travelers, the Shanghai Airport Immigration Inspection Station, on the one hand, used self-developed software such as a precision duty assistance system to forecast airport passenger flow in real time, dynamically adjust the deployment of on-duty police forces, and arrange mobile police forces in advance to quickly ease peak flows. On the other hand, the station fully updated the smart verification counters in the inbound and outbound areas of Terminal 2 and implemented zoned and categorized inspection for inbound foreigners, scientifically setting up personnel diversion and inspection posts to reduce traveler waiting time. At the same time, it arranged a "hundred-person foreign language volunteer service team" to be stationed at the airport at all times, allowing foreign travelers to enjoy barrier-free communication immediately upon arrival.