Analysis of 2017 Chinese Spring Festival Migration Trends Using Big Data

In 2017 the Spring Festival migration, the world’s largest seasonal population movement, concluded, with billions of trips recorded. Big‑data maps show the massive flow of people leaving hometowns for major cities and returning for the holiday.

The migration peak started earlier than usual, beginning at the “little New Year” and remaining high until the 28th day of the twelfth lunar month; the lowest travel volume occurred on Chinese New Year’s Eve, while the post‑holiday return peak began on the second day of the new year and peaked on the sixth.

Analysis of outbound volumes identifies the top 20 cities, which together account for more than 40 % of the national outflow. Visualizations illustrate the destinations of these travelers across the country.

Net‑flow maps differentiate cities with net out‑migration (red) from those with net in‑migration (green). The most attractive destinations are the megacities Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen and their surrounding economically developed regions, with additional pull from Zhengzhou, Chengdu and Xi’an.

Demographic profiling of the ten cities with the highest outbound numbers reveals distinct patterns. First, megacities and hubs such as Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Suzhou, Hangzhou and Dongguan draw migrants from a wide geographic range, whereas cities like Zhengzhou and Chengdu mainly attract migrants from within their own provinces (≈84 % and ≈80 % respectively).

Second, age distribution shows a higher proportion of prime‑working‑age (25‑44) residents in the major hubs, especially Beijing and Hangzhou. An index comparing these cities to the national average highlights this concentration.

Third, education and industry analysis indicates that Beijing, Shanghai and Hangzhou have the highest high‑education indices, while cities such as Dongguan and Foshan rank lower. In terms of high‑salary industry employment, Beijing, Hangzhou, Chengdu and Shanghai lead.

The article concludes that these data‑driven insights, derived from billions of positioning records and hundreds of billions of daily trips, provide a timely reference for understanding urban attraction and migration dynamics during the Spring Festival period.