The South Korean government recently announced that a provisional visa exemption policy would be granted to group tourists from China from September 29, 2025 till June 30, 2026. Previously, China has decided to implement an unilateral visa exemption policy for South Korean as of November 2024. As a result, people-to-people exchanges between the two countries have seen a surge.

Statistics from Qingdao Airport Branch of Shandong Immigration Inspection Station show that Qingdao Airport recorded a cumulative total of over 250,000 entries of South Korean passengers from the nine-month-long implementation period that commenced on November 8, 2024 and concluded on August 7, 2025, representing about 72% of the total number of foreign passengers and soaring 60% on a year earlier. Among them, more than 200,000 entries were subject to visa exemptions. South Korea has become one of Qingdao’s largest sources of tourists.

Since the beginning of last year, “China Travel” has seen a constant rise in popularity, and it has once become an online sensation that young people from South Korea scramble to fly to Shandong after they go off work on Friday. (Zhou Jianliang)

Foreign passengers are going through formalities in the Qingdao Airport Immigration Station.