How Xinjiang has become China’s hottest travel destination

By Luke Johnston

It’s 2019. Three guys at the Urumqi Grand Bazaar waved me over, shocked at seeing a foreigner from Europe. They bought me a drink and with my broken Chinese, their almost‑nonexistent English, and a lot of gestures, we seemed to get on pretty well! I couldn’t believe what I was about to do, as I’d be too scared to do such a thing in my country of the UK, but I agreed when they invited me back to their home for some tea and snacks. By the end of the night I’d learned my first Uyghur word: hoishe (cheers).

I didn’t originally come to Xinjiang for the beauty and nature that many do. I came because of the headlines. Western media had filled my feed with angles, takes, and pre‑written conclusions. I was already in love with China living in Shanghai, and had seen firsthand how many Western headlines completely missed the mark. So I was skeptical about what was being said about Xinjiang — it was the hottest topic in the West at the time, and I had to see it for myself. It was 2021, and curiosity turned into a plane ticket. But I realised something awkward for a skeptic… I wasn’t going home. Not yet. It’s now the place I live.

That’s why I came. But why are so many others coming?

The Numbers

Last year, Xinjiang logged an insane 300 million trips — a new record that capped a two‑year surge from the post‑pandemic floor to national headline status. Tourism revenue climbed to 355 billion yuan (about $49.4 billion), up 21 percent year on year in 2024, while foreign visitors reached about 4.8 million, nearly 50 percent higher than the previous year. The momentum carried into this year: Urumqi alone welcomed over 50 million visitors in the first half of 2025, ranking it China’s third most popular summer destination.

To understand how Xinjiang pulled this off, follow the infrastructure. The new 1,786‑kilometer Lanzhou–Xinjiang high‑speed railway made “one sleep to Xinjiang” itineraries feasible for the masses. In the skies, Xinjiang’s 27 airports handled a record 48.54 million passengers in 2024, while Urumqi International Airport alone processed 27.77 million that year — underscoring its role as western China’s aviation hub. On land, legendary scenic spots like the Duku Highway are no longer just for truckers and adventure cyclists; they’re now routes for young drivers who vlog the drive, and even camp in tents along the way.

Government money and messaging turned infrastructure into momentum. Xinjiang’s playbook is the now‑familiar “culture + tourism” integration: music festivals, night markets, performing‑arts seasons, and consumer vouchers designed to keep people outside — eating, filming, dancing, and spending — deep into the night.

The branding is regionalised and seasonalised: Altay is China’s ski capital; Ili is lavender, horses, and rolling grasslands; Turpan is the kingdom of fruit, wine and bazaars in the autumn; Kashgar is the Silk Road romance; Karamay is the AI hub; and Urumqi is the blend of snow‑capped nature and skyscrapers. Policymakers are also saying the quiet part out loud: they want more foreigners, explicitly, to diversify the economy and lift per‑capita tourism spend. Kazakhstan alone sent a record 1.42 million visitors in 2024.

The Difficulties

You might think Xinjiang would be challenging to navigate—a language completely different from Mandarin or English—but in Urumqi most young people speak Mandarin fluently, making the city feel accessible from the start. However, once I ventured into smaller towns and traditional tea houses, I encountered older locals who spoke only Uyghur. Wanting to hear their stories and truly connect, I decided to take Uyghur lessons.

The results have been remarkable. At Zulay, my favourite café, the owner Alim noticed me practicing Uyghur. Appreciating my effort to engage with his culture, he began writing beautiful Uyghur proverbs in elegant calligraphy on my coffee mug to help me learn. Taxi drivers who once overcharged me as a foreigner now warmly greet me as “adash” (friend). One memorable moment came in Hotan, where a driver was so delighted to meet a foreigner speaking Uyghur that he took a couple of hours off to show me around his city, refusing my repeated attempts to pay. It’s all about genuine hospitality here—nothing feels forced or fake.

A Uyghur Barista wrote a Uyghur proverb on Luke Johnston’s coffee cup, which reads: “Being strong means you can defeat one person, but being smart means you can defeat a thousand.” (Photo courtesy of the author)

Gen-Z Lure

But none of this would be possible without the social media buzz that’s turned Xinjiang into a nationwide destination. As a huge music fan, I’ve seen firsthand how local acts like A-Three and KKLuv, spontaneous street percussion sessions, and Uyghur livehouse bars attract a lively, youthful Gen-Z crowd. Due to the region’s famously long daylight hours, nightlife here often stretches until five or six in the morning, making for incredible entertainment but also causing endless headaches trying to find a taxi—at almost any hour!

One Uyghur livehouse I regularly visit is Jazz-Bar, where I’m the only foreigner in the crowd. At first, the musicians and regulars would gently tease me in front of everyone by firing rapid questions in Uyghur, checking if I could keep up. Now I’ve got better, they’re familiar with me, occasionally sliding a free drink my way, and jokingly ask if I’ve finally memorised the chorus by now.

Jazz-Bar, a Uyghur livehouse with a mixture of Uyghur, English and Chinese songs. (Photo courtesy of the author)

Layer on top the “dress up & shoot” micro‑industry — professional photographers renting ethnic outfits, doing makeup, and delivering same‑day polished sets in Kashgar Ancient City, the Urumqi bazaar, or Turpan’s night streets — and you get an economy that monetises culture while multiplying exposure. Every outfit change is a short video. Every short video is an invitation. Every invitation is a queue.

Gen‑Z Chinese are indeed the biggest drivers at the moment: they come for their viral videos to post on RedNote and TikTok, or the self‑drive adventures along the Duku Highway, camping and trekking on the grasslands, or skiing in Altay — and then they stay up all night at bazaar snack streets live‑streaming while they queue for whatever pastry, kebab, or ice cream is trending. Middle‑aged and older tourists are here too, but for different reasons and with different rhythms: they come to escape the summer heat or settle in for long winter stays; they travel by coach on comfortable packages, and they want Silk Road history, museums, mosque architecture, and regimented itineraries. They spend slower, earlier, and in bulk — on dried fruit, nuts, metalwork, and textiles. Foreigners remain a smaller share, but they’re growing fast from a low base. Central Asian visitors are surging; European and North American adventure and archaeology tourists are returning, cautiously.

If you want two places that explain the whole phenomenon in short, start with one of my favourite places, Urumqi’s International Grand Bazaar. It’s no longer just a daytime market where locals once bought groceries and books; it’s a city‑scale night engine where folk performances, rooftop cafés, live music, photography studios, livestreaming stalls, and coffee carts all feed off each other’s momentum. It functions for locals and tourists at once: residents still haggle for fruit; visitors book packages to get the perfect skyline shot at golden hour. Watch it from morning till midnight and it’s a time‑lapse of an economy: delivery guys at dawn, retirees after lunch, influencers at sunset, buskers at 11 p.m., and cleaners at 2 a.m. resetting the stage.

Then go to Kashgar. The old city didn’t just get preserved; it was activated. Restored mud‑brick lanes now host daily folk performances, artisan workshops, outfit‑rental photo streets, and living museums of intangible heritage. The loop is tight: visitors broadcast culture to millions; that exposure turns into bookings; bookings create income; income makes staying, teaching, performing, and crafting viable; and the cycle deepens. That’s how you get 41 million visitors to Kashgar in a year.

Misconceptions Changing in Real Time

I remember my first day in Xinjiang back in 2019. I thought I couldn’t even take my camera out—there were police roaming the streets, which I foolishly thought were there to watch me.

I then slowly realised how open this place actually is, with vloggers and livestreamers casually filming everywhere. Fast forward to now, and I’ve just made a vlog about the local muslim festival Eid, and you can watch it online where I casually chat with a police officer on the street, comfortably asking him questions in Uyghur about how to celebrate the festival.

In the video, I also interviewed many locals on the street in Uyghur who introduced the festival and explained how they celebrated Ramadan. This, for me, is the best way of finding out how life is here, by talking in their own language to them!

That interaction neatly sums up my Xinjiang journey: arriving with doubts shaped by distant narratives, only to discover a welcoming community ready to share its stories firsthand. Xinjiang taught me the power of seeing a place with your own eyes, engaging directly, and challenging your initial perceptions. Perhaps that’s the most important lesson of travel—to remain curious, to stay humble, and always be open to changing your mind in real time.

The author is a PhD candidate in AI at Shanghai Jiao Tong University. The views do not necessarily reflect those of ECNS.