Myrtle Beach ranks a top autumn vacation destination in the US, popular trip planner says

Chase Karacostas
JASON LEE/jlee@thesunnews.com

The crowds of tourists won’t be disappearing from Myrtle Beach’s shores after Labor Day, TripAdvisor says. The region is among the top 10 most popular U.S. travel destinations for the fall.

The news about Myrtle Beach’s fall popularity isn’t, well, the most shocking, as the Grand Strand was also one of TripAdvisor’s most popular fall destinations last year, too.

Businesses, government officials and the Myrtle Beach Area Chamber of Commerce have worked for years to make the region into more of a year-around destination. Doing so creates more stable employment and reduces workplace shocks by balancing out the usual flood of visitors that appear in March for spring break and abruptly disappear the week after Labor Day.

Myrtle Beach has also benefited from a lack of any major hurricanes since 2019. The most recent hurricane to reach the Grand Strand was Isaias in 2020, and it was a a Category 1 that caused minimal damage during a period of time when there were fewer travelers than usual anyway as the result of the coronavirus pandemic.

The data about Myrtle Beach’s popularity comes from TripAdvisor’s Fall Travel Index, which revealed that six out of 10 Americans still plan to travel this fall despite high inflation and gas prices.

“Because of the pent-up demand for vacation stemming from several years of pandemic restrictions keeping travelers close to home, Americans are cutting back elsewhere to ensure they can still budget a getaway,” TripAdvisor said in a press release this week. “Half of Americans (50%) said that they plan to travel more this fall than they did during the same period last year and two thirds (66%) plan to spend more.”

Travelers plan to save money on their trips by going on shorter vacations and staying closer to home, TripAdvisor said.

Here is the full list of popular fall destinations. Any city with an asterisk was also a top destination for fall last year, according to TripAdvisor.

  1. Las Vegas, Nevada*

  2. New York, New York*

  3. Orlando, Florida*

  4. Honolulu, Hawaii*

  5. Lahaina, Hawaii

  6. Key West, Florida

  7. Nashville, Tennessee*

  8. Myrtle Beach, South Carolina*

  9. New Orleans, Louisiana

  10. Miami Beach, Florida*

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