French Travel Trends 2024- The Results of a Global Survey on Family Travel by Novakid

Novakid is an award-winning online English language school for children aged 4 to 12. They bring English to life through fun and engaging online lessons and to date have taught over 600,000 students, since their inception in 2017.

Alongside their pioneering online language lessons, Novakid also conduct research and surveys looking at the way family life is shaped by different cultures. Here they share the fascinating results of a global survey on family travel, looking at French habits when traveling with children.

A 2024 survey by Novakid , in which 5000 families were interviewed across Europe and South Africa, revealed that French families prioritised cost when choosing a holiday destination. 

The results of the survey showed that when it comes to the cost of holidays, French parents scored 41%, which is twice the average of all the countries surveyed, saying they were worried about the cost of their trip. This may explain why French families do not travel quite as frequently with children as their counterparts in the survey. On average, European parents travel 15-20% more frequently than the French. 

In addition, the survey showed that the French took the lead when it came to traveling without their children:

• 7% of French parents say they do not travel with their children compared to an overall average of only 2.7%.
• 10.5% of French people say they rarely travel with their families, compared to 7% on average.
• Only 0.7% of French people surveyed say they travel regularly with children more than eleven a month living “out of a suitcase”, compared to 5.6% on average in all the countries surveyed.

While health and safety concerns are cited as one of the main concerns for many parents when choosing a holiday destination, only 8.96% of French parents said that they were unduly concerned about it, compared to an average of 26% across countries.

Only 14% of French parents said managing their child’s routine schedule during travel was one of their top challenges, compared to 33.6% for their Italian counterparts across the border. 48% of French parents are keen to ensure their children are entertained during the trip, compared to 64% of their Italian counterparts.

Interestingly, almost 51% of French parents consider packing with their children as one of their key challenges when vacationing, compared to a 39% average across all countries. When asked if traveling with children was very stressful or not stressful at all, French parents’ scores were very close to the average for all countries.

Among French families surveyed, there was a clear tendency to want to travel further afield than Europe, with a tendency to head for the United States, Asia, Australia and New Zealand rather than settling for European travel destinations.

In conclusion, the way that French parents travel with children can be summed up in four key points:

1. The main concern of French parents when traveling with children is packing their bags (51% compared to 39% on average overall).
2. 7% of French parents said they did not travel with their children, compared to a 2.7% global average, and those who did, involve their children less in planning than in other countries.
3. 10.5% of French people said they travel only rarely compared to 7% on average.
4. Only 0.7% of French people say they travel regularly with children more than eleven a month living from a suitcase, while the average is 5.6% in all the countries surveyed.

Read the full results of the survey here (in French). Find out more about Novakid and their innovative approach to teaching English.

Read more articles and interviews about life abroad and raising multilingual children on the MumAbroad blog