Fewer Americans Are Going to France This Summer. Good or Bad?
The European Travel Commission tracks American interest in visiting Europe every year. In 2024, 45% of U.S. travelers said they wanted to go. By 2026, that number had fallen to 34%.
That’s 11 percentage points in two years, the steepest drop the ETC has recorded since it started running the survey.
If you’re still planning to go, that’s your opening.
Why Americans Are Staying Home
Cost is the main reason. The dollar lost more than 10% against the euro in 2025, and European hotel and restaurant prices haven’t come down to meet it.
The second factor is political. Only about a third of people surveyed in France, Germany, Sweden, and the UK said they viewed the U.S. favorably in 2026.
Some Americans are skipping Europe because they’re not sure they want to deal with that energy over dinner.
The third reason is the World Cup. The tournament is being played across the U.S., Canada, and Mexico this summer, which is pulling discretionary travel dollars back toward the Americas.
U.S.-to-Europe flight bookings are down 7.3% year over year.
What’s Still True About France
France drew 102 million international visitors in 2025, the most of any country on the planet, for the 30th year running.
International tourism revenue hit a record 71 billion euros, up 12%.
The Louvre had 9 million visitors in 2025. Notre-Dame pulled 4.2 million in its first year back. These places are not emptying out.
But the Americans who do show up are a different group than they were in 2022 and 2023.
Average American spending per trip to France went up in 2025 even as the dollar weakened. The travelers still going are the ones who planned for it.
The ETC’s own data shows that Europe still ranks highest globally on every safety metric, including political stability and personal safety.
The reluctance is financial and psychological, not about what France is offering.
The Practical Upside
Paris mid-range hotels are running $175 to $250 a night in summer 2026, which is real money but not the Olympic-period insanity.
A round-trip flight from New York to Paris on Air France costs $650 to $1,100 if you book two to three months out.
Air France is running up to eleven daily flights between Paris and the New York area this summer. Capacity isn’t the constraint.
The constraint used to be competition for those seats and rooms from the wave of Americans who went to Europe post-pandemic because they felt like they’d missed something.
That wave has passed. The people who couldn’t get a reservation at a Paris bistro in 2023 without booking three weeks out are mostly staying home this year.
Beyond Paris
Most Americans who visit France stay in Paris. That’s where the post-pandemic crowds were worst, and where prices spiked hardest during the Olympics.
The Dordogne, Alsace, and rural Provence are a different story. Hotels in those regions run significantly cheaper than Paris, the food is just as good, and they were never built for mass tourism volume to begin with.
In a normal summer they fill up fast. This is not a normal summer.
Fewer Americans competing for rooms and restaurant seats means those regions are genuinely accessible now in a way they haven’t been since before the post-pandemic travel surge.
If you’ve been curious about France outside the obvious stops, the math works better right now than it has in years.
Why France Needs You Back
Americans are the top non-European source of tourism revenue in France. No other nationality replaces what they spend.
France isn’t indifferent to the drop in American interest. It’s losing its highest-value visitors, and the industry knows it.
Chinese arrivals are up, but Chinese tourists concentrate in Paris, move through quickly, and spend heavily on luxury retail rather than hotels and restaurants spread across the country.
The 34% of Americans who still want to come are arriving into a country that has every reason to treat them well.
If the dollar recovers or the political mood shifts, American bookings to Europe will spike again and prices will follow.
If you were waiting for a less crowded, slightly less expensive version of France, this is closer to it than anything you’ll get in the next few years.