The 22-year-old “Symphony of Lights” harbor show will come to an end in the second half of this year, to be replaced by periodic light festivals at tourist spots across the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, the city’s tourism chief revealed on Friday.
The revamp was engineered along with other new strategies to “revitalize and light up” traditional attractions and encourage repeat visits, in order to achieve the city’s annual visitor arrival goal of 53.8 million, said Secretary for Culture, Sports and Tourism Rosanna Law Shuk-pui.
Speaking at a media briefing today on the tourism and sports measures unveiled in Financial Secretary Paul Chan Mo-po’s Budget speech on Wednesday, Law projected that full-year visitor arrivals for 2026 will increase by around 8 percent year-on-year.
The forecast is predicated on what Law described as “last year’s remarkable performance” by Hong Kong’s tourism industry, with visitor arrivals nearing 50 million — a 12 percent increase on the previous year — as well as on the 1.77 million arrivals during the recent Chinese New Year holiday, which marked a 14 percent year-on-year rise.
While the extensive tourism-related initiatives announced in the city’s 2026-27 Budget have generated positive feedback, the shutting down of the longstanding “Symphony of Lights” — a nightly show that has illuminated the skyline along both sides of Victoria Harbour since 2004 — has raised concerns among some members of the public.
But Law said the new light festivals are more flexible in content design and involve fewer staff compared with the harbor show. The light shows can also highlight locations of interest to tourists across the special administrative region — among them Victoria Peak, one of the likely hosting venues.
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The citywide light festival is part of the government’s HK$1.66 billion ($212.2 million) reimbursement to the Hong Kong Tourism Board — a 35 percent year-on-year funding boost — along with HK$1.2 billion for sports growth and a HK$200 million fund to breathe new life into rural tourism.
Addressing concerns over Hong Kong’s tourist capacity, Law told reporters the city is well positioned to host the expected increase in visitor numbers. “We (have) managed to accommodate at peak 65 million visitors despite some strain, and with new facilities like the Kai Tak Sports Park, the city’s tourism capacity has only been strengthened,” she said.
Less than a year after its opening, Kai Tak Sports Park’s main stadium was ranked first in Asia and third worldwide in ticket sales, according to a report in December from Pollstar, a US-based entertainment trade publication and data provider.
Law said the new sports development funds will be used to intensify team sports training and bring a wider array of major events to the city.
She confirmed that the current development program for team sports will be assessed after this year’s Asian Games — to be held in Nagoya, Japan from Sept 19 to Oct 4 — with the review results helping inform the funding details and quantum for the next funding round, starting April 2027.
“And in the lead-up to the Asian Games, the government will ramp up funding to encourage the city’s team sports representatives to enter more competitions, to train and enhance performance through participation,” Law said.
Meanwhile, the subsidies for hosting events will be increased by 50 percent to spur national sports associations and local groups in the city to stage more competitions of various scale, Law said.
