Figures highlighting a dramatic fall in US tourism have emerged, just as it pins its hopes on a travel boom from the upcoming World Cup.

Foreign visitor numbers to the US shrank 5.5 per cent last year, despite a global travel boom, according to the World Travel & Tourism Council’s latest economic impact research.

The WTTC said the number of people who travelled internationally leapt by 80 million in 2025 – but many chose to skip the US.

In the first year-on-year decline since the Covid pandemic, foreign visitor numbers to the US fell 4 million. Total spending was down $US8 billion ($A11 billion).

The US remains the world’s largest travel and tourism market. But the figures sparked a warning from WTTC president and CEO Gloria Guevara that it should become a more welcoming destination before it loses to its biggest rival – China.

The report couldn’t come at a more critical moment. Hospitality venues and hotels across America have been counting on a travel boom driven by the soccer World Cup, which begins on June 11.

While Canada and Mexico are co-hosts, the majority of the 104 matches will be played in the US.

The WTTC estimates that 1.24 million international visitors will travel to US host cities, generating roughly $US6.4 billion ($A8.9 billion) in tourism spending. But the signs are already not entirely positive.

This week officials in New York and New Jersey launched a probe into World Cup ticketing practices.

The states’ attorneys-general said they had subpoenaed FIFA following reports that its ticket releases may have contributed to “soaring prices” and after complaints that fans may have been misled about the seats they were buying.

Additionally, FIFA has in recent weeks released thousands of reserved hotel rooms back after disappointing bookings. The American Hotel & Lodging Association has said nearly 80 per cent of hotel operators in US host cities reported reservations falling short of forecasts.

US tourism also faces bigger issues. Its hardline immigration crackdowns under President Donald Trump are putting off many travellers, as are widespread safety concerns.

Trump has ramped up border control measures since his return to the White House, claiming they are designed to protect the US from “foreign terrorists” and other “public safety threats”.

Since late last year, visitors from many nations – including Australia – face having to supply five years worth of social media posts to enter the US.

Under other rules introduced last year, visitors from some countries must pay up to $US15,000 ($A21,000) for visas. However, that has recently been waived for World Cup travellers with match tickets.

“We used to be a country that others wanted to emulate. That narrative no longer exists,” said Juliette Kayyem, faculty chair of the Homeland Security Project at the Harvard Kennedy School and CNN senior national security analyst.

“If you’re a foreigner now, what you’re absorbing about the United States is a dysfunctional government, ICE raids, Americans being killed, crime everywhere.”

Last August, the Australian Bureau of Statistics revealed the US had dropped from third to fourth in Australia’s top-five destination countries in 2024-25.

But it is Canadians who are shunning their neighbour the hardest. Data from mobile tracking firm Cuebiq suggests Canadian travel to major US cities may be down as much as 42 percent in just a year.

Since Trump began his second term, he has floated the idea of making Canada the 51st US state and slapped tariffs on its exports, souring relationships with the US’s northern neighbour.

“Trump instituted his reckless tariffs. In response, Canadians have literally boycotted travelling to America,” Democrat Representative. Susie Lee told Politico.

“That has had a significant impact on our tourism.”

Then there’s the cost of the World Cup

The decline in US travel has collided with concerns about the rising cost of the World Cup matches.

The investigation announced this week focuses on ticketing for eight matches set for MetLife Stadium in New Jersey. They include the World Cup final on July 19.

“FIFA has turned buying a ticket to the World Cup into a gauntlet of confusion, fake scarcity, and impossibly high prices — all at the expense of consumers and hardworking New Jerseyans,” state attorney-general Jennifer Davenport said.

Across the border in New York, her counterpart Letitia James said:  “No one should be manipulated into paying sky-high prices for seats, and fans should be able to trust that the tickets they purchase will be the ones they receive.

This year’s World Cup uses dynamic pricing, which deliberately makes pricing opaque and subject to real-time changes. With it, ticket prices can vary dramatically across games, and even across the same game.

When they went on sale a year ago, group match tickets initially cost about $840. Now they are changing hands for at least $1400 (all in Australian dollars).

There are reports that finals tickets, which initially sold for about $8400, have topped $45,000 in recent weeks.

By comparison, at the World Cup in Qatar in 2022, top tickets for group matches cost about $300. The best seats at the final cost just over $2200.

“I’ve done some number crunching and predict that increased ticket receipts will help FIFA exceed $US15 billion in revenue this world cup cycle – which would be a record-breaker for soccer’s governing body and significantly more than its 2022 stated goal of $US11 billion,” emeritus professor of finance and author of Keeping Score: The Economics of Big Time Sports Richard Sheehan wrote for the Conversation.