Domestic tourism revenue during this period reached 375.843 billion yuan (US$73.29 billion), up 30% year on year, and recovered to 73.1% in the same period of 2019.
During the CNY festival, 10,739 A-level tourist attractions were opened normally, accounting for 73.5% of the total number of A-level tourist attractions in China. About 110,000 mass cultural activities were held nationwide, with about 473 million participants.

The 243 national-level night culture and tourism consumption clusters have 52.122 million visitors, with an average of 30,600 passengers per night in each cluster.

The number of tourists received by Sichuan province ranked first, reaching 53.8759 million, and the tourism revenue reached 24.216 billion yuan, up 24.73% and 10.43%, respectively, year on year, recovering to 89.73% and 84.75% of the CNY 2019. Compared with the total tourism revenue, Yunnan contributed 38.435 billion yuan of tourism revenue in seven days.

According to Qunar data, each traveler traveled 400 kilometers more than last year, and the outbound air ticket was 6.7 times more than that in 2022.

As of January 26, during CNY in 2023, the number of air tickets booked in popular cities had exceeded that before the epidemic (the CNY in 2019).

In 2023, the average price paid for air tickets during CNY was 845 yuan, the same as before the epidemic.

According to Qunar CEO Chen Gang, there will be more opportunities in overseas markets in 2023. During CNY, outbound air tickets increased by 6.7 times over the same period in 2022. The top 5 destinations are Thailand, Hong Kong, Malaysia, the United States, and Indonesia. With the increase in flight supply, it is expected that the number of international air tickets and international hotel reservations will continue to grow.

Duty-free consumption in Hainan continued to be popular. According to Haikou Customs statistics, from January 21 to 27, Haikou Customs supervised 1.56 billion yuan in sales of duty-free shopping, an increase of 5.88% over the CNY holiday in 2022;

The number of duty-free shoppers was 157,000, an increase of 9.51% YoY; per capita consumption is 9,959 yuan.

According to Ctrip data, this year’s Spring Festival, cross-border ticket bookings increased more than four times year-on-year. Bangkok, Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, Chiang Mai, Manila, and Bali have become the most popular international travel destinations for Chinese tourists.

Mao Ning, a spokesman of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of China, responded that during the Spring Festival this year, the number of people leaving the country exceeded 2.87 million, with an average of 410,000 per day, an increase of 120.5% over the same period last year. The overall order for outbound travel of Chinese tourists increased by 640% year on year, and the order for air tickets increased by more than four times.

Mobile payment trends in China outbound tourism

China online accommodation market totaled 39.38 billion yuan (US$5.97 billion) with an increase of 27.1% YoY according to data from Analysis.

Ctrip leads China’s online accommodation market in Q2 2017 with 46.7% market share, followed by Qunar, Meituan and Alitrip.

While China’s more affluent consumers increasingly favor independent travel, the online holiday and group tour booking market is still showing rapid growth, likely driven by continued expansion of the middle class in China. China online holiday booking market overview Q2 2017 »

China online tourism market analysis 2017

While China’s more affluent consumers increasingly favor independent travel, the online holiday and group tour booking market is still showing rapid growth, likely driven by continued expansion of the middle class in China.

In the second quarter of 2017, China’s online holiday booking market grew to 21.77 billion yuan (US$3.26 billion), equating to year-on-year growth of 28%.

While this figure is slightly lower than that for Q1 2017, this is common as the second quarter in China lacks any long public holidays and opportunities for travel are more limited; traditionally, the first and third quarters are peak season for group tour bookings.

During 2017, the National Tourism Administration has taken measures to combat group tours with unrealistically low prices, believing that these are likely to be low-quality and rely on forcing tourists to engage in activities and shopping for added fees in order to recoup costs.

This policy has come as part of a comprehensive effort to revamp and improve the quality of group tours in China and make high-quality travel more accessible to the burgeoning middle-class, as well as to restrain monopolistic practices and anti-competitive pricing.

Travel e-commerce platforms including Tuniu and Ctrip have responded with their own efforts to increase quality and standardize customer experiences. Ctrip released a new “diamond standard” rating system and released a new high-end line of tours.

Lvmama’s “Happy Donkeyback Travel” line also received an upgrade, wherein the platform began enforcing a “no forced shopping, no hidden costs” program and worked to make sure tour operators weren’t receiving kickbacks and commissions from local sites and retailers.

In addition, market trends towards independent travel are forcing tour providers to move in the direction of greater personalization and more authentic experiences for tourists. Themed tours are becoming more common, including food and minority culture tours.

Capital is continuing to flood the market, with startup “Travel Book” completing A round financing for more than 10 million yuan (US$1.5 million). Travel Book is a building a travel planner and tour guide platform which will help travelers put together optimized itineraries and daily plans for travel on tours and independent trips.

Regarding market share in the second quarter, Tuniu (with 26.83%) and Ctrip (with 22.84%) remain the top two players in the market, sharing half of the market between them. Tuniu has been able to strengthen its supply chain and improve member services, and has earned customer approbation with its strong customer service and professional tour guides.

It’s innovative review system allows customers to compare hotels, sites, and experiences from inside and outside packaged tours to better choose tour packages for themselves. Ctrip is leveraging its acquisition of Qunar to build a better e-commerce platform for tours, and totaled 4.92 billion yuan (US$ 737.6 million) in tour revenue in Q2.

Below the top two, LY.com and Lvmama maintained market shares of  14.52% and 14.35%, respectively. They, too, worked to improve quality and standardization, with Lvmama in particular trying to build a set of personalized and highly diverse tour packages for its customers.

Analysys analysts believe that online holiday market will continue to expand and customer habits continue to develop, as resort packages are being accepted by a wider range of markets.

Given the demand for personalization, enterprises are working to optimize operational efficiency, and continuously drive product and service segmentation and personalized upgrades. Enterprises are moving from business development towards a deeper cultivation of their customer bases, pointing towards a healthy trend of development within the overall market.

During 2016, the online tourism market in China maintained steady growth over the year prior, growing much more quickly than GDP growth while increasing its overall penetration into the tourism industry as a whole.

Overall, online booking of hotels and plane tickets maintained leading positions within online tourism sales, and individual travel bookings dominated the industry (as opposed to group tours). The trend towards individual, independent travel is beginning to dramatically affect the market, mostly in ways which are beneficial to the online travel booking industry.

Tourism industry revenue trends

The tourism industry in China has maintained a growth rate far above GDP growth for several years, growing at over 10% year-on-year every year for the past five years. In 2016, the total market reached 4.69 trillion yuan (US$ 703 billion), having grown by 13.6% from 2015.

This growth rate is also slightly higher than 2015, when growth over 2014 was 11.0%. Tourism accounted for 6.3% of China’s GDP in 2016, also a slight increase over 2015 (6.0%).

Meanwhile, the online tourism market is growing much more rapidly than the tourism market overall; in 2016, online tourism revenue reached 739.42 billion yuan (US$110.85 billion), representing 56.1% growth over 2015. As a result, online tourism has increased its market share from 11.5% of the market in 2015 to 15.8% in 2016 (up from 6.6% in 2012).

Online tourism market overview

From 2015 to 2016, there were minor changes in the structure of the online tourism market in China. In 2016, as before, online booking of transportation (plane, high-speed rail, conventional rail) dominated the market, with total revenue of 538.5 billion yuan (US$80.7 billion), followed by accommodation booking with 125.1 billion yuan (US$18.8 billion).

Group tours and tour packages made up the remainder; market share shifted in favor of transportation, which rose from 70.2% to 72.8% of the market, taking equally from accommodation and tours, which both slid from 2015 by about 1.3%.

Within the online tourism market, there were three major players and a host of minor ones. The major players, Ctrip, Qunar, and Fliggy, collectively dominated the market in 2016, with 68.7% of market share. Ctrip maintained a commanding lead, holding 35.7% of the market (263.6 billion yuan or US$39.5 billion), a slight decline over the year prior in terms of market share.

Qunar, however, slid dramatically after being bought out by Ctrip; in 2015 it accounted for 27.8% of the online tourism market, but dropped to only 18.2% in 2016. Minor players stepped into the gap in a big way, moving on the backs of a market shift in favor of O2O and featuring several new players which combine tourism sales with Tripadvisor-like crowd-sourced advice and reviews.

Online tourism investment overview

When it comes to investors, holiday and accommodation booking are still the two sectors which attract the most attention and capital. With Chinese tourism spending continuing to rise and holiday booking markets still in their infancy, there is significant room for online providers to make an impact and earn a return on investment in this sector.

Within the holiday booking industry, international travel continues to be a growth market and a driving force. While overall investment share declined significantly from 2015, holiday booking is still an under-served market and will continue to attract attention and financing going forward.

In addition, investment into travel finance is noteworthy; a new and much-watched market, with investment only appearing in 2016, it is driven by Chinese consumers’ increasing willingness to amortize major expenses beyond a home.

Online tourism markets: Sector breakdowns and analysis

Online transportation market

Of all sectors, transportation booking has the highest online market penetration rate, with online booking accounting for 54.6% of sector revenue. As consumers in China come to prefer independent travel over group tours, online booking has become the preferred way of buying train or plane tickets because of its convenience and economy. In 2016, the online transportation market grew by 62.0% to reach 538.5 billion yuan (US$80.7 billion).

The market share breakdown within the online transportation market mirrors the breakdown within the online tourism market as a whole, with the same three major players accounting for 69.4% of the market in 2016.

As with the overall market, Qunar has seen a dramatic fall in market share from 2015 to 2016, dropping by a whopping 12.5% to 20.5% following its purchase by Ctrip. Ctrip has maintained a commanding lead as the largest player in the market, especially with the addition of Qunar.

Minor players have stepped into the market in a big way, with sites such as Tuniu (which formerly focused on group tours and holiday packages) introducing transportation booking platforms.

The most important component of online transportation booking, China’s online plane ticket booking market has grown in lock-step with (indeed, been the primary driving factor behind) growth in the online transportation booking market.

In total, plane tickets account for 88.5% of online transportation booking revenue, and 68.1% of all plane ticket revenue comes from online bookings. From 2015 to 2016, this market has grown by 60.9% to 476.7 billion yuan ($US 71.5 billion). By comparison, train and bus tickets are a small portion of the online transportation booking market, and online booking’s penetration into these areas is quite low.

Online accommodation market

The market for online accommodation booking in China is the second largest component of the online tourism industry, with a value in 2016 of 125.1 billion yuan (US$18.75 billion), and accounting for 32.6% of the accommodation booking sector within China. This market is also growing far more quickly than the tourism market in China, but u

This market is also growing far more quickly than the tourism market in China, but unlike the online transportation booking sector, its year-on-year growth fell markedly from 2015 to 2016, from 57.6% in 2015 to 45.1% in 2016.

The four major players within the online accommodation booking market in China are Ctrip, Qunar, Fliggy, and eLong, which collectively account for 74.4% of the market. Qunar, as mentioned above, was acquired by Ctrip in 2016, as was eLong, meaning that that one holding company collectively controls 67.3% of the market for online accommodation booking.

Market share for both Qunar and eLong has fallen significantly from 2015 following their acquisition by Ctrip. Their market share has been eroded in part by the entry of Meituan (A Groupon analog) into the hotel booking market in a big way in recent months.

Online holiday and tour markets

The online holiday and tour booking market is simultaneously the smallest sector of the online tourism industry and the one in which online platforms have the least penetration, accounting for only 10.3% of the online tourism industry and 17.5% of holiday and tour booking.

Its comparatively small market penetration is one of the reasons that it has attracted significant attention and capital from investors in recent years, but in 2016 the sector saw markedly smaller growth (37.7%) compared to 2015 (58.2%), reaching a total revenue of 75.7 billion yuan (US$11.3 billion).

Analysis sees long-term, slow growth in the online side of the industry as it slowly increases market penetration relative to offline providers, but the industry as a whole may be falling out of favor with consumers who are increasingly interested in independent travel.

Analysts concluded that the industry may be entering a period of “deep plowing and careful cultivation” (a Chinese idiom roughly meaning “retrenchment”) in which more strategically-minded participants restructure their operations to suit changing consumer preferences and many participants are weeded out entirely.

As with the other sectors, the online holiday booking market is dominated by several major players (with a total market share of 76.5%), but excepting Ctrip none of the players are the same as in the other sectors, due to the wildly different conditions and requirements faced by the industry. Compared to 2015, market consolidation has increased; market share for the largest four players in 2015 was 68.4%.

Given the conditions faced by the market, market entrants increasingly focus on upscale tours rather than the economy group tours which were the mainstay of the industry, and the major participants are restructuring their operations accordingly.

One bright spot within the online pre-packaged tour/holiday booking industry remains international tourism, which accounts for 56.0% of the market. Outbound tourism has been immune to many of the headwinds faced by the market for domestic group tours, buoyed by issues related to language, safety, and tourist visa access for Chinese traveling abroad.

However, the growth rate has slowed even for the international group travel market; Analsys analysts suggest that, as Chinese consumers become wealthier and more experienced internationally, and as foreign countries become more adapted to and comfortable with Chinese tourists, the same preference for independent travel which has already manifested itself for travel within China will come to do so for international travel as well.

China’s air ticket online booking market is upcoming and on the rise, with seen increases in market share and dominance of certain air divisions, coupled with increased direct sales channels to enhance the pace of growth.

According to Analysys’s released report in Q1 of 2017 on China’s air ticket online booking market, its market size reached 132 billion yuan (US$19 billion), with a year on year growth rate of 31.8%, as seen in the chart below.

Following the July 2016 revised ticket sales policy for the pay-per-month segment vote, each air division is aimed at improving corporate profits, exerting market dominance and directing marketing channels to accelerate the pace, all working with OTA to rectify the ticket agent industry.

This year, the airline continued to strengthen its platform and held sales of the tickets, hotels, tour package through direct channels in order to increase market share.

With each air divisions playing individual strategies with increased intensities, OTA’s profit margins are gradually decreasing. This quarter, while OTA is continuing to enhance product experience and operational efficiency, at the same time, it is also focussing on the layout of higher prices of the international air ticket market.

From engaging in depths of integration, and aspects of upgrading, manufacturers provide more competitive online aviation service products. On the other hand, manufacturers further strengthen the international ticket product and service side of supply through online international voyage and flagship stores.

China online travel market overview Q1 2017

China online travel market exceeded 210 billion yuan in Q1 2017 with an increase of 51.5% YoY, led by Ctrip, Qunar, and Alitrip.

It consists of online transportation booking (71.9%), online accommodation booking, and online holiday booking.

Ctrip has 35.19% market share in China’s online travel market, followed by Qunar (17.28%), and Alitrip (13.57%).

In Q1 2017, the market concentration has increased, with the market share of Qunar, Ctrip and Alitrip summing up to a whooping 73.6%. Amongst these three, online ticketing transaction size is 50.2 billion yuan, 27.69 billion yuan, and 19.22 billion yuan respectively.

Analysys analysts believe that since the overall market space for online tickets is still huge, coupled with a positive outlook on the tourism industry, the demand for air travel is still on the rise. At present, despite the increase in online air ticket sales, OTA is still the main channel for the booking of air tickets. The main direction of future development of this industry would be to actively possess creative business models, improve online service experiences, and increase consumer reliance.

China online accommodation market overview Q1 2017

The transactions of China online accommodation market totaled 37.202 billion yuan in Q1 2017 with an increase of 43.24% YoY according to data from Analysis.

Ctrip leads the market with 46.6% market share, followed by Qunar, Meituan, eLong, and Alitrip.

China’s domestic tourism insights in 2017

Qunar was ranked the top generic travel booking app by coverage in September 2016 according to data from TalkingData, followed by Ctrip and LY.com apps.

12306, China Railway’s official app, remains the top choice for train tickets booking. Spring Airlines made it to the top among airlines booking apps with 0.43% coverage, followed by apps from Eastern Airlines (0.27%), China Southern Airlines (0.2%) and Air China (0.15%).

Among accommodation booking apps, Home Inns, eLong and Airbnb are the top 3 by coverage. Airbnb, Tujia and Mayi are the only three homestay network platforms in the top 10 while the rest are for hotel bookings.

Huawei, Samsung, and Xiaomi smartphones are the most popular Android brands among travelers during this year’s National Day holiday.

The top mobile apps for travel information by coverage are Mafengwo (0.58%), TripAdvisor (0.48%), Travel Translator (0.31%; by Mafengwo), Qyer (0.26%), and Breadtrip (0.22%).

China online travel market reached 155.71 billion yuan in the first quarter of 2016, up 58.9% YoY or 14.7% QoQ, according the research company Analysis.

Ctrip and Qunar led the online travel market with 35.6% and 30.2% market share in Q1 2016 respectively, followed by Alitrip (14.8%).

Ctrip achieved net revenues of RMB10.9 billion (US$1.7 billion) with a gross margin of 72% in 2015, up 48% year-on-year according to its official unaudited financial results.

Ctrip’s accommodation reservation revenues were RMB4.6 billion (US$713 million), representing a 44% increase from 2014. The hotel reservation revenues accounted for 40% of the total revenues in 2015 and 41% of the total revenue in 2014.

For the full year ended December 31, 2015, transportation ticketing reservation revenues were RMB4.5 billion (US$688 million), representing a 51% increase from 2014. The transportation ticketing revenues accounted for 39% of the total revenues in 2015 and 38% of the total revenue in 2014.

Packaged-tour reservation revenues were RMB1.7 billion (US$257 million) in 2015, representing a 58% increase from 2014. The packaged-tour reservation revenues accounted for 15% of the total revenues in 2015 and 14% of the total revenues in 2014.

Corporate travel revenues were RMB473 million (US$73 million), representing a 27% increase from 2014. The corporate travel reservation revenues accounted for 4% of the total revenues in 2015 and 5% of the total revenues in 2014.

In October 2015, Ctrip completed a share exchange transaction with Baidu. Upon completion of the exchange, Ctrip beneficially owned ordinary shares of Qunar representing approximately 45% of Qunar’s aggregate voting interests.

In January 2016, Ctrip made an investment of US$180 million in MakeMyTrip Limited (“MakeMyTrip”), India’s largest online travel company, via convertible bonds.

For the first quarter of 2016, Ctrip expects to continue the net revenue growth year-on-year at a rate of approximately 75-80%, reflecting the consolidation of Qunar’s financial results.

Also read: China Travel Market Overview for Q4 2015

Top 10 travel mobile apps in China were Ctrip, Qunar, CY, Didi Travel, Tuniu, Kuaidi Travel, eLong, Airplane Butler, High-speed Rail Butler and Lvmama in 2015 according to www.ctcnn.com. More Chinese travelers are active on the mobile end than PC.

Moretravel products have been developed in China in 2015 including self-driving trips, budget travel, backpack travel and others according to Qunar.

Ctrip and Qunar maintained rapid growth in terms of monthly downloads in 2015. Users on mobile end increased by 400% YoY in Q3 2015. Orders on the mobile end accounted for over 60% of overall travel product orders on Double 11 shopping festival.

Qunar gained 975.5 million yuan (US$149.52 million) from the mobile app in Q3 2015 which accounted for 73.6% of overall revenues with an increase of 33.2 percentage points compared with 40.4% in Q3 2014.

Ctrip acquired Qunar in early 2015 and the two apps exceeded about 1.5 billion new downloads in 2015. Didi merged with Kuaidi in 2014 and promoted online travel services in the following year. Didi Travel app gained over 300 million new downloads in 2015.

The total number of orders from the mobile app of Tuniu accounted for more than 70% of the overall 1,668,325 trips in Q3 2015. CY had over 100 million yuan (US$56.31 million) generated on Double 11 and over 90% came from the mobile end. Lvmama accumulated about 200 million new downloads and became the tenth largest travel app in China in 2015.

Also read: China Hotel Search Behavior Overview 2015

China’s online accommodation booking market reached 24.983 billion yuan (US$3.89 billion) representing a QoQ growth of 27.98% and YoY growth of 82.16% in the third quarter of 2015 according to Analysys.

China’s online travel market reached 122.23 billion yuan (US$19.07 billion) with an increase of 18.0% QoQ and 45.9% YoY in the third quarter of 2015 according to iResearch. The OTA market in China reached 5.96 billion yuan (US$0.93 billion) in Q3 2015 with an increase of 48.8% compared to the same period last year, led by Ctrip and eLong.

The online accommodation market maintained a rapid growth in the third quarter of 2015 under the constant promotions of China’s online accommodation and online travel agencies. Overall transactions of online travel market totaled US$19.07 billion in the third quarter and the OTA market in China gained US$0.93 billion.

Ctrip reached revenues of 10.762 billion yuan (US$1.68 billion) with 43.08% market share. Transaction values of Qunar were 5.63 billion yuan (US$0.88 billion) accounting for 22.54% online accommodation booking market. Ctrip, Qunar, eLong and Alitrip combined account for almost 85% total market share, 4.14 percentage points higher compared to the previous quarter.

Continue reading on China online travel booking users in Q3 2015 here.

China’s online accommodation booking companies have attempted in exploring more effective cooperation modes and integration methods between the online and offline. By an increasing number of China’s tourists and promotion of industrial chains, the online accommodation booking market in China will continue to grow in the future.

Also read: China Short-term Accommodation Market Overview 2015

Online family tours market in China has been in the rapid development on both mobile and PC end. Transaction value of China’s online family tourism was 6.51 billion yuan (US$1.02 billion) in 2014 and it is expected to achieve 76.2% growth to 11.47 billion yuan (US$1.8 billion) in 2015 according to iResearch.

Travel tours in China are usually categorized by travel distance as getaway trips at nearby attractions, mid- to long-distance trips, and outbound trips. By sales volume, getaway trips are the most popular. Family trips refer to travel trips by parents and children together.

Among potential family tour travelers who haven’t yet made the bookings, 55.8% prefer free and easy trips in which they don’t have to be in a group following a tour guide. 52.5% would choose long-distance domestic trips. Among those experienced family tour travelers, the ratio of following a group is higher and they prefer getaway trips.

China’s major online family tourism companies can be divided into three groups according to their themes and products:

• Separate family trips section, represented by Lvmama and Tuniu.
• Mixed family tourism section, represented by Ctrip and Alitrip where users can get the section by filtering website search results.
• Related family trips products, represented by Qunar and Utour which only have related tourism products.

The top ten cities parents and children like most are Beijing, Zhuhai, Suzhou, Shanghai, Chengdu, Hong Kong, Dongguan, Foshan, Hefei and Hohhot. Apart from family tourism, business tourism, award tourism and mass tourism are also full of bright market prospect.

Also read: China Tourists Travel Intention Study 2015

China’s domestic travel frequency has been gradually increasing based on Qunar’s data from January to September 2015.

Travelers under  21 years old account for 14.25% of the total, and most of them are accompanied by their parents during travel. The post-90s is the main driving force of China tourism market, accounting for 39.97% of the total online travel booking users. Consumers aged between 31 and 35 y-o account for the smallest percentage of total travelers. Travelers over the age of 36 get stabilized recovery.

Lovers and couples like traveling most, accounting for 44.66%, followed by the whole family trips and individual trip. The ratio of individual travelers is increasing.

With the improvement of economic development and income level, travel is becoming an important need in people’s living in China. Self-driving trips, budget travel, backpack travel and others are rapidly included in the territory of modern Chinese ways to travel. While most consumers travel as a planned trip, their advanced bookings are made in a relatively short period. 46.21% travelers make bookings 5 days in advance. Only 8.3% travelers may make bookings more than 30 days before the trip.

Mid- and low-end hotels are major preference of consumers. As high as 43.25% will book hotels under 300 yuan, and only 12.67% over 800 yuan.  Due to the popularization of Qunar, Ctrip, and other online hotel booking websites, more high-end hotel prices get deep discounts.

Among 32 capital cities in China, Beijing, Shanghai, Chengdu and Guangzhou received most online bookings. Lhasa, Hohhot, Yinchuan and other midwestern residents rank at the bottom, who travel less.

Dali, Kunming, Lijiang, Xishuangbanna, Hong Kong, Jiuzhaigou, Sanya, and Beijing are top 8 inbound destinations; Bangkok, Pattaya, Krabi, Phuket, Bali Jeju and Seoul are top 7 Southeast Asian destinations. Citizens in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Chengdu, Hangzhou, Xiamen, Shenzhen, Sanya, Chongqing and Xi’an are most willing to spend money on accommodation during tourism in order to enjoy a more comfortable travel.

Also reads: China to invest $278.7 Billion in Tourism in 2025

Despite the continuous weak growth and even decline in smartphone sales in China, major domestic mobile phone manufacturers still set a “big leap” of shipping target in H1 2015. Although foreign brands iPhone and Samsung still held a large market share, domestic brands as Huawei, Lenovo, Xiaomi and TCL etc. all set their phone sales volume at 100 million units.

In Q2 2015, Xiaomi was the top smartphone vendor in China by total shipments volume of 15.9%, followed by Huawei (15.7%). Apple ranked third, followed by Samsung and Vivo.

China Mobile, China Telecom and China Unicom, the three Chinese telecommunications companies accounted for 90% of the market.

4G network penetrated quickly into Chinese people’s life while users accessing to the internet through Wi-Fi accounted for 52%, mainly because of the high data charges of 4G network.

25% China mobile internet users on average opened less than 5 apps per day while over 60% would use less than 10 apps. Only 2.9% users would open more than 20 apps in one day. Tencent, Alibaba and Baidu still led China’s mobile internet market.

Among the top 20 mobile apps by total number of monthly average users, seven apps were from by Tencent. And among all the mobile apps in China in July 2015, WeChat and QQ ranked first with the monthly average users of 556.48 million and 424.28 million respectively.

WeChat and QQ were the social communication platforms with the highest penetration rate. Among the usage of the top 20 apps, users spent about 27% of the total apps usage time on WeChat and QQ. Search engine, video, and music player apps were also popular among mobile internet users.

Tencent held a strong position in the mobile social platform. Mobile internet users spent more time on WeChat compared with QQ; however among the post-00s, QQ was the major communication tool.

In the mobile video player market, Tencent, iQIYI and Youku led the market, with fierce competition and little gap of MAU (monthly active users) and total usage.

In the mobile music player market, Kugou music undoubtedly took the lead, followed by QQ Music and Kuwo Music.

Tencent News enjoyed a large share in China’s news apps market while Toutiao was in the process of fast penetration. Toutiao and Tencent News were quite close in total usage time. The daily usage of Toutiao was even twice that of Tencent News .

Offers from China online travel providers such as Ctrip and Qunar have extended to provide more on “things to do” in travel destinations. China online travel providers have also expanded to provide lifestyle offers such as food delivery, movie ticketing and car renting. In H1 2015, Ctrip and Qunar continued the growth momentum, which contributed to the tourism market of China.

Resulting from the convenience of online banking and online payment, mobile online banking apps developed quickly. China Construction Bank ranked first with monthly average usage of 2.32%.

China became the largest e-commerce market since 2014. About 53% users were women in 2015. Taobao held an unaltered position in the online e-commerce market, followed by JD and Vipshop.

In the mother care market, Beibei ranked first with an overwhelming advantage, whose monthly average usage was more the sum of other four apps.

Competition was fierce in the  cross-border hopping market, and Red ranked first in H1 2015 with a market share of 0.19%.

Meituan still ranked top on the group-buying apps in H1 2015, followed by Dianping and Nuomi while Ele continued to compete and was expected to be competitive to Meituan in the monthly average usage.

Meituan and Ele dominate the food delivery market. Ele led the market in Beijing and Shanghai while Meituan held an obvious advantage in other cities. Beijing made up of nearly 10% of the total food delivery share.

Car calling market was basically shared by Didi, Kuaidi and Uber. Although Uber China made much effort in the localization of Uber, the number of daily average users was only one third that of Didi Cars/Kuaidi One.

WeChat payment has gradually been adopted by more users. Many apps supported payments by WeChat. Didi and Meituan were first two apps that used WeChat payment as the primary payment method.

Also read: China Top 100 Mobile Apps in July 2015

Since January 2015, the number of active users on mobile apps has surpassed that of the PC side, and the gap is gradually increasing. Online travel websites are increasing efforts to transform to mobile end to compete for more users.

Ctrip leads the online tourism market while Qunar attracts more consumers on mobile end, followed by LY, Alitrip and Tuniu.

Also read: China Mobile Internet Trend 2015

In Q2 2015, China’s online accommodations booking market reached 19.52 billion yuan (US$3.09 billion), with an increase of 15.9% QoQ and 63.5% YoY.

Also read: China Online Vacation Market in Q1 2015

In Q1 2015, the total transaction value of China online vacation travel market reached RMB11.06 billion (USD$1.80 billion), an increase of 59.8% year-on-year, and 21.7% QoQ according to the data of Analysys EnfoDesk.

•  Online vacation travel business extends to destination service.

In January. 2015, Ctrip released Local Play channel, Qunar set up Tourism Destination Bureau; in April, Tuniu began its online Local Play channel, and supported sighting, show tickets, wifi communication, foods, outdoors activities and others in many cities all over the world. The new measures of several major tourism companies show that destination service would be the most important part in 2015 online travel market.

•  Online vacation travel market penetrates into the upper section of industrial chain, online and offline services integrate further.

Tuniu increased its resource direct mining share to improve its supply chain, merged Zhongshan Travel and Classic Holiday Travel Agency to put forward some projects and at the same time ran its special projects to meet different needs of consumers.

Also read: Chinese Luxury Traveler Insights 2015

The total transactions of China online travel market reached 94.76 billion yuan (USD 15.28 billion) in Q1 2015, an increase of 51.3% YoY or 9.4% QoQ.

Offers from China online travel providers such as Ctrip and Qunar have extended to provide more on “things to do” in travel destinations. China online trave providers have also expanded to provide lifestyle offers such as food delivery, movie ticketing and car renting.

Ctrip and Qunar in total accounted for over half of China’s online travel market by total transaction values. Alitrip, Alibaba’s ambition in China online travel market only launched in October 2014, already grabbed over 10% of China’s online travel market.

71.3% of China online travel market transactions came from transportation online booking.

Also read: China Outbound Travelers Spent Close to $500B Overseas in 2014

China online travel was a RMB307.79 billion (US$50.33 billion) market with an increase of 38.9% in 2014 according to iResearch. Online ticket market, online hotel booking market and online vacation exceeded RMB193.07 billion (US$31.57 billion), RMB63.25 billion (US$10.34 billion) and RMB44.88 billion (US$7.33 billion) respectively in 2014.

China online ticket market is relatively mature in online travel market. According to iResearch’s data, online ticket booking market value in 2014 was RMB193.07 billion with an increase of 41.1%.

It is believed that there are two major reasons for online ticket’s rapid development in China:

1. Qunar, Alitrip and other online travel companies now provide various online ticket service.
2. Airlines now promote their official websites to provide attractive price for travelers.

Also read: China Rural Travel Exceeded 1.2 Bln Person-trips in 2014

Qunar total revenues for the fourth quarter of 2014 were RMB519.8 million (US$83.8 million), an increase of 107.1% year-on-year.  Mobile revenues  were RMB257.5 million (US$41.5 million), an increase of 400.7% year-on-year, representing 49.5% of total and 52.3% of pay-for-performance (“P4P”) revenues, compared to 20.5% and 22.6%, respectively, in the corresponding period of 2013.

Total Estimated Flight Ticket volume (TEFT) and Total Estimated Hotel Room-night volume (TEHR) for the fourth quarter of 2014 were 24.6 million and 8.9 million, respectively, an increase of 61.8% and 107.7% year-on-year.

Qunar’s Performance in Fiscal Year 2014

Qunar’s total revenues for fiscal year 2014 were RMB1,756.8 million (US$283.1 million), an increase of 106.5% YoY. Mobile revenues for fiscal year 2014 were RMB708.7 million (US$114.2 million), an increase of 434.9% YoY, representing 40.3% of total revenues. P4P revenues for fiscal year 2014 were RMB1,666.7 million (US$268.6 million), an increase of 115.9% year-on-year.

Among the P4P revenues, flight and flight-related revenues for fiscal year 2014 were RMB1,171.2 million (US$188.8 million), an increase of 112.5% year-on-year. Year-on-year P4P flight and flight-related revenue growth were primarily due to a 64.0% increase in TEFT and a 29.6% increase in revenue per ticket.

P4P hotel revenues were RMB347.3 million (US$56.0 million), an increase of 79.0% year-on-year. Year-on-year P4P hotel revenue growth was primarily due to a 98.1% increase in TEHR and a 9.7% decrease in revenue per room night.

Gross profit for fiscal year 2014 was RMB1,301.9 million (US$209.8 million), an increase of 92.1% year-on-year. Gross margin for fiscal year 2014 was 74.1%, compared to 79.6% for 2013. The year-on-year increase in gross profit was primarily due to the significant increase in total revenues, and was partially offset by an increase in online payment processing fees, recorded in cost of revenues, which the Company began to incur in the first quarter of 2014.

Also read: Travel Industry Performance on Weibo 2014

Qunar announced its alliance with 22 of the world’s premium high-end hotel groups. The hotel groups, which include Wyndham, Club Med, Banyan Tree, Howard Johnson, and Millennium, will open their global inventories to the Qunar platform.

Qunar’s travel search platform covers over 540,000 hotels globally and over 223,000 hotels within its direct hotel network, having become the second largest hotel platform in China in terms of room nights stayed in Q3 2014.

Qunar will work closely with the hotel groups to develop a diverse range of products, including pay-upon-arrival, prepay, group buy, and “flight + hotel” packages, as well as integrated marketing campaigns. The company will also provide consumer intelligence to help hotels increase occupancy rates with better yield management. Qunar will offer its unrivaled data-analysis capabilities to help the hotel groups grow and deepen their membership bases and help to promote those hotels’ loyalty programs to more Qunar users.

Qunar’s total revenues for Q3 2014 more than doubled YoY to US$81.6 million and its mobile revenues was US$33 million an increase of 445.1% YoY. And, it attempted foreign online travel market in December 2014 with the launch of its overseas sub-brand: Qua; and this English website domain is qua.com which provides international air-tickets booking service for English users.

Also read: China’s Top 4 Online Travel Companies Compared

Different from UGC (use generated content) market in foreign countries, China online travel UGC market is directly in the “free” stage, skipping the “paid” phase, which indicates that users can obtain and share travel guide and note freely. According to iResearch, online traveling UGC users will exceed 360 million in 2015 in China.

In recent years, UGC enterprises are playing more and more important role in China online travel market. UGC enterprises attract users with accurate travel need to provide large amount of traffic for OTA companies and other suppliers. Meanwhile, they can help users make decision.

At present, there are two kinds of parties in China online travel UGC market. One is vertical companies, such as Mafengwo.cn, Qyer.com. The other one is travel guide community, like Ctrip guide online community.

In 2014, users in China online travel UGC market will be 240 million with an increase of 128% from the same period of prior year, which is estimated by iResearch. Besides, there are 80 million people in Ctrip Guide community, ranking top, followed by Mafengwo.cn and Qyer.com with 55 million and 50 million users respectively.

In 2013, Mafengwo.cn’s users were about 20 million while in 2014, the number exceeded 55 million with an increase of 175%. The top 3 travel guide mobile apps in China were Tuniu travel guide, Mafengwo, and Qyer guide in September 2014.

Also read: China’s Top 4 Online Travel Companies Compared

On 12 Dec 2014, Qunar launched its overseas sub-brand: Qua; and this English website domain is qua.com which provides international air-tickets booking service for English users.

The volume of international air-tickets booking is increasing steadily on Qunar.com. However, the Chinese version only caused many trouble for English users overseas to book tickets online. Now, when clicking on the channel for English users on Qunar.com, the English users will land on qua.com to finish tickets booking.

“New sub-brand of Qunar is one step for marching into international market.” said Yang Wei, the executive vice president of Qunar.

Besides, Qunar has already provided payment method with Paypal for overseas users and set their oversea mobile phone numbers as contact numbers.

On Android platforms alone, Qunar Travel apps had reached 105.716 million times by May 2014, being the first travel app exceeding 100 million downloads. Qunar travel guide app was one of the top travel guide mobile apps in China in September 2014.

Qunar’s mobile revenues for the third quarter of 2014 were RMB202.7 million (US$33.0 million), an increase of 445.1% year-on-year, representing 40.4% of total revenues.

Also read: China Online Travel Market Overview in Q3 2014

The travel guide app helps travelers make their travel plan in destinations. The top 3 travel guide mobile apps in China were Tuniu travel guide, Mafengwo, and Qyer guide in September 2014.

Tuniu travel guide app had 967 thousand monthly active users in September 2014, ranking top, followed by Mafengwo and Qyer guide app. Qunar travel guide app’s MAUs had a decrease of 28.42% according to data of EnfoDesk. While Qunar’s total revenues for Q3 2014 more than doubled YoY to US$81.6 million and its mobile revenues was US$33 million an increase of 445.1% YoY.

The top 6 travel guide mobile apps in China all had stable growth in use frequency and total time spent in September 2014. With China’s inbound and outbound tourism booming, the demand for travel guide mobile apps with good service will be much stronger.

The workers in China accounted for 38.72% among the respondents in September 2014.

Chinese young people who were between 25 and 30 years old accounted for 36.23% of all travel guide mobile app users. These young ones tend to accept news and explore fresh things much more than the other age groups in China. Over 56% of China outbound travelers are post-80s, followed by post-70s (26.4%) and post-90s (11.3%) according to data released at Beijing Fragrant Hills Tourism Summit.

The travel guide mobile app users with income between 3,000 and 4,999 yuan accounted for 35.94%, which was the main income group in September 2014.

Also read: China Online Travel Market Overview in Q3 2014

Qunar’s total revenues for Q3 2014 more than doubled YoY to US$81.6 million and its mobile revenues was US$33 million an increase of 445.1% YoY.

Qunar’s total revenues for the third quarter of 2014 were RMB501.1 million (US$81.6 million), an increase of 107.8% year-on-year. Mobile revenues for the third quarter of 2014 were RMB202.7 million (US$33.0 million), an increase of 445.1% year-on-year, representing 40.4% of total revenues, compared to 15.4% in the corresponding period of 2013. Pay-for-performance (“P4P”) revenues for the third quarter of 2014 were RMB476.4 million (US$77.6 million), an increase of 119.3% year-on-year and 25.8% quarter-on-quarter.

Qunar’s total Estimated Flight Ticket volume (TEFT) and Total Estimated Hotel Room-night volume (TEHR) for the third quarter of 2014 were 22.7 million and 10.0 million, respectively, an increase of 57.0% and 84.6% year-on-year.

Hotel network direct sales contributed 51% of Qunar’s total hotel volume for the third quarter in 2014. Mobile continued to be a key driver of the growth, accounting for 40% of total revenue, 55% of TEHR, and 43% of TEFT.

For the fourth quarter of 2014, Qunar expects year-on-year revenue growth in the range of 90% to 95%.

Find out Ctrip and eLong’s Q3 performance here and here.

Also read: Guest Satisfaction Research of China Hotels

Qunar’s mobile app exceeded 8 million MAUs in August 2014 in China according to EnfoDesk, remaining the most popular mobile online travel app, followed by that of Ctrip, LY, eLong, Daodao and Taobao Trip.

The number of Ctrip Mobile App downloads has reached 200 million in Q2 2014 in China. On Android platforms alone, Qunar Travel apps had reached 105.716 million times by May 2014 being the first travel app exceeding 100 million downloads.

China top 6 online travel mobile apps all had rapid use frequency growth rate , especially the one from LY.com who had 148.22% growth rate in total use frequency growth rate in August 2014.

Also read: China’s Top 4 Online Travel Companies Compared

China’s traveling industry is booming these years. With various choices of travel companies, Chinese people are more enthusiastic about traveling ever than before. Among all online travel companies in China, Qunar.com, Ctrip, eLong and LY.com are the most popular ones by total number of reached users nowadays.

Qunar’s daily reach on mobile device exceeded 2 million in China online travel industry in June 2014, which made it top online travel company by mobile reach from April to June 2014, followed by Ctrip, LY.com and eLong according to data from iResearch.

Qunar.com total revenues for the second quarter of 2014 were RMB400.4 million (US$64.5 million), an increase of 127.3% year-on-year; the number of total mobile app activation exceeded 270 million, which was much bigger than the number of any other online travel company in China.

Most of the online travel companies had increased total number of air-tickets booking on mobile device in Q1 and Q2 2014. And Qunar.com accounted for 38% of air tickets booking in Q2 2014, which had a great growth rate from prior quarter in 2014.

The rate of hotel booking on mobile device of online travel companies was over 40% which shows online travel company can stimulate hotel ‘s development.

Qunar.com total revenues for the second quarter of 2014 were RMB400.4 million (US$64.5 million), an increase of 127.3% year-on-year, the highest revenue growth rate in ten quarters.

Qunar has built strength on mobile. Qunar Travel apps downloads had reached 105.716 million times by this May being the first travel app exceeding 100 million downloads according to Jinlv Consulting, a research and consultancy firm for travel industry. Its mobile revenues for Q2 were RMB142.3 million (US$22.9 million), an increase of 511.8% year-on-year, representing 35.5% of total revenues, compared to 13.2% in the corresponding period of 2013.

Total Estimated Flight Ticket volume (TEFT) and Total Estimated Hotel Room-night volume (TEHR) for the second quarter of 2014 were 19.1 million and 7.3 million, respectively, an increase of 66.1% and 105.2% year-on-year.

We witnessed another strong quarter of accelerating revenue growth and impressive volume growth across our business units, driven by market share gains and pricing leverage. Returns on our investments have been coming in earlier and quicker than we had expected,

said Chenchao (CC) Zhuang, chief executive officer and co-founder of Qunar.

Flight revenue per ticket grew 46% year-on-year, a testament to our growing market position and to the superior value proposition Qunar brings to travel service providers.

We remain focused on providing consumers with the most comprehensive product offerings and best deals in the industry,

Mr. Zhuang added.

In the second quarter alone, we signed over 72,000 hotels, taking our direct sales network to over 165,000 hotels. We also consolidated our position as the platform of choice for mobile users. Tour package GMV maintained its rapid momentum, expanding by more than five times year-on-year.

We are pleased to see our investments in technology and product sourcing continue to drive strong growth right across the business,

said Sam Sun, chief financial officer of Qunar.

However, Qunar sees loss in the second quarter. Net loss attributable to Qunar’s shareholders for the second quarter of 2014 was RMB421.6 million (US$68.0 million), compared to RMB41.2 million in the corresponding period of 2013 and RMB183.6 million in the first quarter of 2014.

For the third quarter of 2014, the Company expects year-on-year revenue growth in the range of 90% to 95%. This forecast reflects Qunar’s current and preliminary view, which is subject to change.

Get an overview of China’s online travel market here.

Source: Qunar

On Android platforms alone, Qunar Travel apps had reached 105.716 million times by this May being the first travel app exceeding 100 million downloads according to Jinlv Consulting, a research and consultancy firm for travel industry.

Qunar mobile client ranked the best travel booking app by total number of monthly active users (5.077 million), according to recent data from Analysis International, followed by Ctrip Travel (3.304 million), LY.com travel app (723 thousand), and eLong (702 thousand).

According to Yeepay, an online payment solution provider in China, 98% of mobile travelers used mobile payment.

With the deepening development of the online travel industry, increasingly sophisticated mobile client features, more consumers feel more and more at the time of traveling and enjoying the convenience of “Wireless Reservations”. At the same time, the industry giants have continued to launch wireless client promotions; “cheap + easy” is prompting tourists travel booking quickly shifting to the wireless client.

Early in the morning on April 10, 2014, Elong’s staff received an email from CEO announcing the strategic cooperation with 17u.

Baidu’s recent purchase in Ctrip’s shares aroused a great disturbance in the OTA industry, after all Ctrip and Qunar’s market share accounted for 33.9% and 22.1% respectively. The joint of Ctrip and Qunar would control about half of the billion dollar market.

The actual merge of Ctrip and Qunar will take a long time, facing a lot of challenges. Therefore, the strategic cooperation between Elong and 17u will be one step ahead of Ctrip and Qunar. However, the OTA leader and the biggest vertical travel search Qunar, plus China’s biggest search engine Baidu with huge traffic resource, the merge will be invincible. The though of it quickened the cooperation of Elong and 17u.

As the second leader in OTA market, Elong chose to work with 17u backed up by Tencent. Elong’s price war with Ctrip lasted over a year cost it consecutive six quarters’ net profit loss. Data showed that in online ticket booking market, 17u remained as the number one but Ctrip rose to the third place through price war. In 2013, 17u only accounted for 2.1% hotel booking market, while cooperating with Elong which owns plenty of hotel resources seems to be a better choice.

It’s natural Elong seeks cooperation with 17u. In 2011, Tencent purchased 16% Elong’s stake with $84.4 million. 17u also accepted two investments from Tencent, the recent $500 million was the biggest financing in OTA market.

On April 10 2014, news from insiders showed that Baidu’s acquisition of Ctrip was going to finish. Once the acquisition is done, Ctrip will be merged with Qunar. Baidu invested USD 306 million in Qunar in June 2011, and became the largest shareholder.

By April 10, Ctrip’s market value was USD 7.228 billion and Qunar’s market value was USD 3.486 billion, the total market value of Ctrip and Qunar added up to around USD 11 billion.

Many of Ctrip’s institutional shareholders were also Qunar’s, the idea of the two’s merging came up early but only got approved until recent.

The Change of OTA Market

Not only Baidu had the intention of acquiring Ctrip, rumor said that Alibaba wanted to. Baidu’s acquisition means that Ctrip gave up develop independently, many of Ctrip’s competitors chose to rely on giant internet enterprises. Qunar accepted Baidu’s investment, Tencent held Elong’s 16% stake with USD 84.4 million in May 2011. On Feb 17 2014, CEO of 17u Wu Zhixiang confirmed in inner email that 17u had received 500 million yuan (USD 81 million) investment from Tencent and other two institutions, and the goal of 17u was still IPO.

It used to be battle between Ctrip and Qunar, now the OTA market turned to the fight among Baidu, Alibaba and Tencent, also known as BAT.

Taobao Trip, belonged to Alibaba, was launched in 2010. In 2013, Alibaba joined OTA O2O market with etao (an online shopping search engine), in cooperation with Ctrip, Elong, 17u, Qunar, Mangocity and qmango. In March 2013, Alibaba invested in mobile travel app 177go, which also became an important mobile terminal traffic driving for Taobao Trip. In July 2013, Alibaba invested in Qyer, a Chinese travel information and value-added services website. In March 2014, Alibaba announced a new investment together with CBC (China Broadband Capital). Byecity, the first Chinese outbound OTA, gained USD 20 million investment from Alibaba and CBC.

In 2013, Ctrip’s travel business transaction reached 10 billion yuan (USD 1.62 billion), organized 3 million person-time trip. Ctrip and Qunar were the major market players in OTA, with market share of 33.9% and 22.1% respectively. When the acquisition and merger finish, Baidu will be the leader in OTA market in China.

Why Does Baidu Choose Ctrip?

Ctrip is the biggest OTA in China, its revenue comes from three parts: hotel booking, ticket booking and travel. Although Baidu’s Qunar had accumulated a lot of business resources for several years, it still could not challenge Ctrip especially in high-end business travel market. If Baidu could integrate Ctrip with Qunar, Baidu will control the whole OTA market in China.

Before March 8 in 2014, the International Women’s Day, Qunar conducted an online survey of female travel enthusiasts. Post-80s accounted for over 56% of respondents. In terms of travel frequency, 41% of respondent chose 1-2 times inbound travel and 1-2 times outbound travel; about 15% said they “quite enjoy traveling”, and would travel for 3-5 times inbound, more than 1 time outbound. Although it’s difficult to take a leave, about 30% of respondents would choose travel time of over 8 days, which was enough for long term inbound travel or outbound travel.

When people talk about women, they always talk about love. For the question “Where do you want to ‘elope’ to with your man?”, Maldives was the most favorite “eloping” destination with 37% of the vote. About 34% of women would “go to Europe for ancient castle and church, travel as further as we can”. Some respondents said romantic places such as Aegean Sea of Greece and Venice are their “eloping destination”.

Women’s passion about island travel was apparent in this survey. When it comes to choosing islands for travel destination, visa-free/visa-on-arrival islands such as Maldives and Bali got 52% of the vote, becoming the favorite islands of women. “Niche” islands like Fiji, Mauritius and Seychelles became the new darling with 39% vote.

Who makes the route decision and who pays the bill during travel? As the survey showed, about half women chose “I am a woman, I decide and pay”, and 27% voted for “Men and women discuss to make the decision and men pay the bill”. Only 11% chose “Women decide, men pay”.

Travel alone is always associated with emotions like relax, romance and healing. Among all respondents, 23% would go to “seaside cities such as Sanya” for solo travel. Moreover, Tibet and Lijiang were in the top 3 of “favorite destination for solo travel” list. Taiwan, Thailand, Japan and Korea were also the chosen ones.

As for travel types, self-guided travel was the favorite travel type of 41% women. This was a result of higher education and income level of female tourists and the influence of new Tourism Law. Only 5% of respondents voted for “package tour (pure fun)”. Furthermore, “semi-free tour” with guided route and 1-2 days free time was also favored, ranking the second with 39%.

Different from effeminate impression of women, most (over 70%) women would accept “manly” route. More tomboys now! About 37% of respondent chose “mountain climbing/cycling/hiking”, while 31% would “go Africa for watching animal migration”, which was considered the men’s favorite.

It’s women’s nature to go shopping. Where do you want to go with your close girlfriends? 41% said Japan or Korea, cause they could buy cosmetics there with friends. And 28% chose the holy land of shopping, Hongkong.

For travel companions, 62% of women would travel with friends, families and colleagues, while less than 45% of them chose to travel with their lovers.

And here is the last and funnest question: which constellation do you dislike to travel with? About two out of ten women chose Taurus, who was considered as stingy, calculating and “crazy about AA”. Besides, “always in the room” Pisces, “no reason why” Virgo, “easy to get angry” Aries and “quite aggressive” Capricorns were on the second to five places on the list.

The price war of ticket and hotel booking is eroding the profit of OTAs (online travel agents) in China. The growing outbound travel market has become their new battlefield.

According to National Business Daily, American hotel booking website Hotels.com announced a new Chinese website name called “Hao Ding Wang” on March 5 in 2014, focusing on outbound travel hotel booking. Their Chinese website and mobile app had launched a new booking page.

China became the world’s biggest source of tourist in 2011. According to UNWTO (United Nations World Tourism Organization), China outbound traveler was estimated to break 100 million in 2014. The rapid developing outbound travel market represents the growing demand of outbound travel service. It creates new opportunities for OTAs at home and abroad.

Last year, Elong launched China’s first international hotel booking app, followed by Ctrip, Qunar and Qyer.

Ctrip cooperated with famous international hotel suppliers such as Booking.com and Agoda, to offer the best price options on its website. Qunar announced working with its competitor Ctrip. Qunar would do SEM (search engine marketing) on Qunar platform for Ctrip’s business information including hotel, air ticket and vacation travel. Recently Ctrip said there would be further cooperation with Qunar. Alibaba also invested more than 10 million dollar on Qyer for outbound travel business. At present, the relationship between OTAs is co-competition.

Zheng Rongfeng, the head of Aiyou.me said, “The booming China outbound travel market caught the eye of domestic and foreign OTAs, entrepreneurs and investors. Hotels.com is not the first one launching Chinese website; HRS has done this before and even launched an AR (augmented reality) booking App. But these foreign agents have been faced with the problem of adaption. They failed to provide services suited Chinese consumers, especially the service of phone call consulting and online payment.”

So domestic OTAs started to cooperate with foreign OTAs or large international hotel groups, represented by Ctrip’s cooperation with Booking.com. However, the efficiency of such cooperation still needs to improve.

Wei Changren, CEO of Ctcnn.com believed that outbound traveler would demand more personalized service of international hotel booking, as self-tour became popular. He said the cost of signing a contract with an international hotel was quite high, so most domestic OTAs chose to cooperate with international OTAs. The different ability and standard of domestic OTAs led to varying competitiveness.

Industry insiders said although foreign OTAs intensified the competition, they also brought opportunities of learning for domestic OTAs. “After several years of exploration in China market, domestic OTA giants have the advantage of better local service. They know about Chinese travelers, and they have more convenient payment channels. Ultimately, domestic OTAs will own more market share, persuading foreign OTAs to work with them.” said Zhen Rongfeng.

This is the part 3 of a series of posts that gives you insights on China LBS travel market users behaviors. Part 1, Part 2.

Travelers who used mobile map apps showed a relatively high demand for POI information. 69.8% of them demanded for detailed shops information in the neighbourhood, 53.5% asked for shops coupons nearby. 69.8% consumers searched restaurants on mobile map app, 58.1% searched for tourist site.

Mobile map app began to enter catering industry, and Dianping still had advantage in catering industry with 58.7%. Baidu map ranked the second with 41.3%, followed by Autonavi with 26.1%.

Consumers would gain comment, coupons, group buy information on mobile food apps.

Vertical mobile app for searching hotels in travel had great advantages, except for Baidu map, which ranked top with 48.9% gained wide recognition for its one-stop services. Ctrip ranked the second with 37.8%, and Qunar hotel ranked the third with 28.9%.

In tickets booking market, vertical apps won the hearts of consumers, 63.6% consumers used Qunar to book air tickets, train tickets and tourist sites tickets. Ctrip ranked the second with 54.5%. Tickets booking mobile app still needed to expand their market, about 10% users barely used these apps.

Mobile taxi apps were just in the beginning stage, consumer using habits still needed to cultivate. 70% consumers barely used taxi apps. In the future, with the growing of DIY tour, the demands for taxi mobile apps would grow.

According to iResearch, China online travel market reached 58.56 billion yuan (USD 9.54 billion) in Q3 2013, 17.1% more than that of 2012. China OTA total revenue reached 3.01 billion yuan (USD 490.33 million), with a YoY increase of 12.9%.

Ctrip topped in the OTA market with 48.9%, followed by Elong and 17u. The top three OTA occupied more than 50% of the whole market.

Ctrip’s vacation packages on Qunar and its mobile-end strategy drove its growing, expanding its market share. Elong’s core business is hotel booking, the boom of Q3 travelling which led to large amount of hotel bookings brought Elong’s growth. 17u offered 9-year anniversary discount, at the same time, it launched DIY tour to stimulate market growth.

Ctrip had undergone transition from OTA (Online Travel Agency) to MTA (Mobile Travel Agency). Its Q2 finance report showed that Ctrip mobile-end occupied 20% hotel booking and 15% air ticket booking. Elong, too, had over 20% mobile hotel booking, and it official changed its online hotel into mobile hotel.

According to CTCNN, a Chinese travel industry finance media, the top 10 travel apps in September 2013 were Qunar, Ctrip, Huoli, Elong, Mafengwo, Best Tone, Tianqu, Top Trip, 17u and KingwayStudio.

Qunar ranked the top in the list, with 52.88 million download times; followed by Ctrip with 41.04 million download times. The download times of the top 9 all remained above 10 million.

Travel apps kept growing at a relatively fast speed. In comparison with August, the number of app developers whose total download times above 10 million increased 1, and those above 1 million increased 4 in September.

Elong had the fastest growing rate in September, it increased 6.85 million download times monthly. Qunar ranked the second with 5.56 million download monthly increase.

Many online travel agencies had transferred their focuses on mobile end. In the first half of 2013, 23% of Qunar’s total search came from mobile devices; and in hotel industry, 47% of total search came from mobile end. Besides, Ctrip launched mobile app version 5.0 in September. Qunar and Ctrip’s apps total download times always remained the first and second. Travel agencies are less likely to cooperate on mobile devices because of the independence of apps, in the future, the fight over mobile end would be even more fierce than online competition.

According to CTCNN, a Chinese travel industry finance media, the top five air tickets booking travel websites in September 2013 were Qunar, Ctrip, Mangocity, Kuxun and Elong.

Except Mangocity, user coverage of the other top 4 sites all dropped in September in comparison with August. Mangocity had a dramatic growth in air tickets booking, with a MoM increase of 92.3%. Elong suffered the biggest MoM drop with 22.9%.

Online air tickets rarely had promotion and the travel demands decreased after the summer vacation which led to the air tickets booking drop.

Ctrip, the largest online travel agency in China, has begun cooperation with its old rival Qunar which is the Chinese leading travel search engine on vacation packages recently after a long time price war and  war of words. Besides, it is said Ctrip and Qunar will further cooperate on air tickets and hotel booking.

The cooperation surprised every one because Qunar launched its Total Solution, an aggregation platform where online travel orders can be directly processed, and wanted to become an OTA which forced other online travel agencies such as Elong and 17u leaving Qunar.

Now, Elong, 17u have appeared in Qunar search results again. Ctrip has been listed in Qunar’s supplier and launched more than 20 vacation itineraries.

Ctrip shouldn’t have conflicts with Qunar, but Qunar wants to directly provide a reservation service and its TTS intercepts user data. However, Ctrip cooperated with Qunar as Taobao joined online travel market. In 2012, Ctrip led the market in air tickets and hotel booking, Taobao ranked the third in air tickets market and the fourth in hotel booking and topped in vacation reservation with 46.2%, which is a bigger threat to Ctrip than Qunar.

The OTA+vertical search business model is very appealing. Qunar could bring large traffic to Ctrip, and Qunar also needs capable suppliers like Ctrip. The cooperation doesn’t involve Qunar’s TTS, once we click on Qunar search results, it leads to Ctrip to finish the transaction.

In Q2, China online travel OTA market share was quite stable with Ctrip, Elong and 17u staying as the top three players. Ctrip topped with 48% share, followed by Elong with 9.1%, 17u with 6.5%.

Ctrip, 17u, 118114, Mangocity had advantages in air tickets booking market; Ctrip, Elong, 17u, 118114 occupied large percent of hotel booking market; Ctrip and 17u enjoyed a big share in vacation booking market. Online travel market was highly competitive, partly due to the popularity of mobile online services.

Baidu, with its widespread map service, bought Qunar shares to control air tickets booking markets; Alibaba invested in amap and qyer, etao entered online travel market as well; Tencent invested in Elong and 17u, extending its online travel business on Weixin Platform.

According to AdChina research, Ctrip and Qunar are the top online hotel and air ticket booking websites. Over 50% business travelers made online bookings on Ctrip and Qunar.

Generally speaking, business travelers who travel more than 4 times tend to choose online bookings.

AdChina’s research also shows the demographics feature of business travelers. 39% of which travel 2 or 3 times in half a year is between 20 to 29 years old, and 40% of which travel more than 10 times in half a year is between 30 to 39 years old.

Most business travelers choose online hotels and air tickets booking websites. Search engines are often used too.