Global travel contributed a record $11.6 trillion to the world economy in 2025, according to the World Travel & Tourism Council’s latest Economic Impact Report. It’s a milestone the industry will want to celebrate. But for DMO leaders in the United States, the more important number sits in a different line of the same report.

Foreign visitors to the U.S. spent roughly $176 billion last year — more than $14 billion less than in 2024. North America was the slowest-growing region for travel and tourism globally, with the sector’s economic value up only about 1% year over year while most of the world posted solid growth.

The U.S. Travel Association’s own forecast backs this up: domestic and international travel together supported roughly 15 million American jobs and generated about $3 trillion in output in 2025, with inbound visitation projected to grow again in 2026 on the back of the FIFA World Cup, America 250, and Route 66’s centennial.

What This Means for DMOs

For destinations that built their international strategy around pre-pandemic assumptions, 2025 was a correction. Currency headwinds, long-haul air capacity, visa wait times, and sentiment shifts all hit at once. The 2026 recovery is real, but it’s event-driven, and events end.

DMOs with meaningful international exposure should be doing three things right now. Pressure-test international forecasts for 2026 against source-market-level data, not national averages. Build a scenario for what 2027 inbound looks like without mega-event lift. And make sure domestic demand investment is not quietly starved to chase World Cup dollars that will flow through a narrow window of host cities.

The headline number from the WTTC report is that the global industry has fully moved past recovery and is now in structural growth mode. The quieter number is that the U.S. is underperforming its peers on inbound for the first cycle in a decade. Both can be true. DMO strategy should reflect both.

Photo by MChe Lee on Unsplash