Climatic resources are vitally important for tourism, driving major intra-and interregional travel flows for sun-sand-surf (3S) tourism around the world. The development of climate indices to measure the suitability of climate for major tourism market segments has evolved over three decades. This study provides the first application of the holiday climate index (HCI):Beach specification in the Asia-Pacific tourism region. The HCI is designed from international tourist climate preference studies and is compared with the tourism climate index (TCI), which is widely applied, but not based on tourist climate preferences. The index inter-comparison is conducted at 14 of the most popular beach resort destinations in China, which include four geographic regions of China with four different Köppen classifications. The results show key differences between the two indices in rating the climatic suitability of the selected beach destinations in China, with the TCI rating beach destinations in the north and south higher during the spring and fall seasons, which is not consistent with beach tourism visits. During the summer months, southern destinations have much higher HCI:Beach rating, reflecting the 3S tourists' desire for higher temperatures. The findings reinforce those from other tourism regions that indicate the TCI is not appropriate for assessing 3S tourism potential and that additional cross-cultural studies of tourist climate indices are needed to better inform market segment climate service development and to understand the potential impacts of future climate change. Keywords Holiday climate index (HCI). Tourism climate index (TCI). Beach tourism. Coastal. China

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The evaluation of climate comfort for tourism can provide information for tourists selecting destinations and tourism operators. Understanding how climate conditions for tourism evolve is increasingly important for strategic tourism planning, particularly in rapidly developing tourism markets like China in a changing climate. Multidimensional climate indices are needed to evaluate climate for tourism, and previous studies in China have used the much criticized “climate index” with low resolution climate data. This study uses the Holiday Climate Index (HCI) and daily data from 775 weather stations to examine interregional differences in the tourist climate comfortable period (TCCP) across China and summarizes the spatiotemporal evolution of TCCP from 1981 to 2010 in a changing climate. Overall, most areas in China have an “excellent” climate for tourism, such that tourists may visit anytime with many choices available. The TCCP in most regions shows an increasing trend, and China benefits more from positive effects of climate change in climatic conditions for tourism, especially in spring and autumn. These results can provide some scientific evidence for understanding human settlement environmental constructions and further contribute in improving local or regional resilience responding to global climate change.