Some 1.05 billion passenger trips are expected to be made during the annual Spring Festival travel rush in China, which will end on Friday, the Ministry of Transport said on Thursday.

The number has increased by 20.7 percent compared with last year, but was down 64.8 percent from 2019, the year before the onset of COVID-19 pandemic.

Figures show that a total of 250 million trips will occur via railway, 750 million via roads, 16.3 million by water, and 39.2 million by air.

This year's Spring Festival travel rush started on Jan 17. An earlier official statement estimated about 1.18 billion passenger trips would be made during the 40-day period.