This Ontario city was just named the biggest tourist trap in Canada

A Niagara tour boat to the falls approaches the Horseshoe Falls in Niagara Falls, Ontario on Friday, July 16, 2021. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Peter Power

Niagara Falls has been deemed Canada’s top spot for attracting tourists who have money to burn.

According to a newly released report by U.S.-based vacation home rental and property management company Casago, the kitchy Canadian border town is the country’s biggest tourist trap. On a global level, Niagara Falls came in seventh place.

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Back in January, the team at Casago started doing unfiltered worldwide searches of the phrase “tourist trap” on TripAdvisor.

They then gathered the names of attractions/places, addresses, and the number of mentions of “tourist trap” in thousands of accompanying reviews.

The world’s top 10 biggest tourist traps were deemed to be those with the highest number of mentions of “tourist trap” in their reviews.

Casago then repeated this process by changing the location filter for each country and each U.S. state removing entries that indicated that the attraction/place was not a tourist trap.

Worldwide, they set a minimum threshold of 10 mentions of the phrase ‘tourist trap.’

In both cases, the threshold was set at five or more mentions.

The data found that four of the 10 biggest tourist traps in the world are located in the United States with San Francisco’s Fisherman’s Wharf topping the list with 1,049 mentions of the phrase in reviews. Each year, the west coast city’s Fisherman’s Wharf neighbourhood attracts roughly 12 million visitors.

Barcelona’s Las Ramblas street, which received 793 mentions, was found to be the second-biggest tourist trap in the world, followed by Oahu, Hawaii’s overpriced Dole Plantation (708 mentions).

The Dole Plantation was also the second place finisher in the U.S, followed by New York’s Times Square.

A map of the biggest tourist traps in every country, according to a 2023 Casago report.

Casago is offering a number of tips to visitors so they don’t fall into a tourist trap.

The first piece of advice was to shop around for discounts when ticket prices for “must-see places” are exorbitant and to research when the quietest times to visit are as admission to events and attractions may be cheaper in off-peak periods.

“See if you can buy a ticket in advance as well to save on long lines and crowds at the ticket booth,” they said, pointing to advice from Insider that suggests tourists avoid places with long lines, crowded areas, and gift shops, and attractions that are popular on Instagram and have their own hashtag.

When it comes to getting something to eat, Casago is urging visitors to keep away from restaurants with employees outside trying to draw you in.

“One of the best ways to have an authentic experience of a new place is to go off the beaten track, dining where the locals recommend and taking a scenic walk through quieter streets,” they urged.

“If you’re on the lookout for a souvenir, consider skipping the keychain and scoping out locally made crafts instead.”