By Michael Salerno | Arizona Republic (abridged)
Canadian tourism to Arizona fell 22% in 2025, not to the record lows seen during the COVID-19 pandemic, but still a dramatic drop.
About 664,000 Canadians visited Arizona in 2025, about 188,000 fewer people than in 2024, according to new data from the Arizona Office of Tourism, the state’s tourism research and marketing resource.
The state’s new preliminary data expands the picture of the impact that Canadian boycotts on tourism to the U.S. had on Arizona, a key market for snowbirds looking to escape Canada’s cold winters. Several airlines reduced service to the U.S. and expanded flights to Mexico and the Caribbean.
Data from Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport showed a dip in traffic aboard Canadian airlines. Airport officials cited this decline as a significant reason why the airport’s overall passenger traffic fell 1.3% in 2025 following a record year of more than 50 million passengers in 2024.
How many Canadians visit Arizona?
Arizona welcomed about 664,000 Canadian visitors in 2025, according to the Arizona Office of Tourism. That’s 22% fewer visitors compared to 2024 and a far cry from the record 975,000 Canadians that visited in 2018. However, it’s more than double the pandemic low of 257,400 visitors in 2020.
The declines in Canadian visits to Arizona were apparent even in good news for state tourism.
International travel at Sky Harbor is improving from 2025, with strong interest in the new China Airlines and Starlux Airlines flights to Taiwan offsetting the drops in Canadian travel, Phoenix Aviation Director Chad Makovsky said in a recent Phoenix Aviation Advisory Board meeting.
Overall international visitation to Arizona grew to about 5.38 million in 2025, a modest increase of 1.2%, despite the losses in Canadian visitors, according to AOT. Arizona has the fifth-largest share of international travelers in the U.S., surpassed only by California, New York, Florida and Texas, according to Tourism Economics.
March 2026 marked Sky Harbor’s all-time busiest month with 5.1 million passengers flying in and out of the airport. But only 78,590 of them flew on routes to Canada, down from 115,430 passengers in March 2025, airport data showed. That same month, Canadian carrier WestJet saw a 40% drop in Sky Harbor traffic, mostly from fewer passengers deplaning in Phoenix from Canada.
Why are fewer Canadians visiting Arizona?
Arizona Office of Tourism staff cited policy sensitivity, economic pressures and competition from other destinations as the reasons for the drop in Canadian visitors in 2025.
Experts attribute the declining demand for Canadian tourist visits to the U.S. in part to Canadian travelers’ negative sentiment of President Donald Trump’s tariffs on Canadian goods and his calls to annex Canada as the 51st state. Some Canadians are also avoiding U.S. travel because the Canadian dollar is weak against the U.S. dollar.
Nationwide, many U.S. airports have lost routes to Canada because of lower demand from Canadian travelers and snowbirds. Many Canadian airlines have refocused their winter schedules on routes to Mexico and the Caribbean to meet greater demand from Canadians for those flights.
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