The Offline Economy: $696.7 Billion and 2.4% of GDP

Overview

The idea that people are turning away from screens toward physical experience is measurable, and the federal statistics that measure it disagree with each other in an instructive way.

The outdoor recreation economy accounted for 2.4% of US GDP in 2024 — $696.7 billion in value added, up from $639.5 billion and 2.3% the year before. Rising as a share of GDP means it grew faster than the economy overall.

National park visitation moved in the opposite direction. After a record 331.9 million recreation visits in 2024, visits fell to 323 million in 2025 — a decline of 8.85 million, or 2.7%.

Money spent on outdoor recreation rose while visits to the country's best-known outdoor destinations fell. That divergence is more interesting than either number alone, and it complicates any simple account of people going outside more.

$696.7 Billion, 2.4% of GDP

The outdoor recreation economy is measured in a federal satellite account, which applies national accounting methods to a defined set of activities and produces figures comparable to other GDP components.

For 2024 it recorded $696.7 billion in value added, equal to 2.4% of current-dollar GDP. That places outdoor recreation in the same range as several major industries and makes it a genuine sector rather than a lifestyle category.

Having a government statistical agency measure it this way matters. Most claims about consumer trends rest on industry surveys or market research; this one rests on the same methodology used to measure manufacturing or construction.

Growing Faster Than the Economy

The share figure carries more information than the dollar amount. Outdoor recreation rose from 2.3% of GDP in 2023 to 2.4% in 2024.

A rising share means the sector outgrew the wider economy. In dollar terms, value added increased from $639.5 billion to $696.7 billion — roughly 9% growth in current dollars, comfortably ahead of nominal GDP growth over the same period.

Sustained share gains are the meaningful signal in sector data. Any category grows in nominal terms during an expansion; growing as a proportion of output means resources and consumer spending are genuinely reallocating toward it.

But Park Visits Fell 2.7%

The counter-evidence comes from the most visible measure of outdoor activity. The National Park Service recorded 331.9 million recreation visits in 2024 — a 2% increase and a record, surpassing the previous high of 330,971,689 set in 2016.

In 2025 that reversed. Visits fell to 323 million, a decline of 8.85 million or 2.7% from the record.

A single year's decline is not a trend, and park visitation is sensitive to weather, wildfire closures, staffing and access conditions. But it directly contradicts claims of record-breaking outdoor participation, and it is the most authoritative visitation count available.

Two Measures, Opposite Directions

Reconciling a growing outdoor economy with falling park visits is where the useful analysis sits, and several explanations are consistent with both.

Spending per participant may be rising. Someone buying better equipment, a more expensive vehicle or premium travel contributes more to the economic measure while making no more visits — and equipment and vehicle purchases are a large share of the satellite account.

Activity may also be shifting away from national parks specifically. Local trails, state parks, private land and boating or fishing require no national park visit at all, and would register economically without appearing in the visitation figure.

The least flattering explanation is that the economic growth reflects price rather than participation. In a period of elevated prices for equipment, travel and accommodation, current-dollar value added rises even if the same number of people do the same things.

Why Value Added Isn't Gross Output

Two very different figures circulate for this sector, and the difference is methodological rather than a disagreement.

The $1.2 trillion figure often quoted is gross output — the total value of all goods and services produced, including intermediate inputs. The $696.7 billion figure is value added, which counts only the value created at each stage and avoids double counting.

Value added is the correct measure for comparison with GDP, because GDP is itself a value-added measure. Quoting gross output alongside GDP overstates a sector's economic weight, and this is one of the more common ways sector sizes get inflated in reporting — including by industry bodies with a reasonable interest in the larger number.

Five Million Jobs

The employment figure gives the sector a different kind of significance. Outdoor recreation supports around 5 million American jobs.

These are distributed differently from most large industries — concentrated in rural and gateway communities near recreation areas, in retail and equipment manufacturing, in guiding and instruction, and in accommodation and food service.

That distribution is why outdoor recreation attracts bipartisan political attention that its GDP share alone would not explain. It represents a rare category of economic activity that cannot be offshored and that supports employment in places with few alternative industries.

What the Offline Economy Actually Includes

The composition is broader than the phrase suggests, and knowing what is counted changes how the growth should be interpreted.

The satellite account covers conventional activities like hiking, camping, hunting, fishing, boating, skiing and cycling — but also the manufacture and retail of the equipment involved, recreational vehicles, and the travel, accommodation and food service associated with recreation trips.

Recreational vehicles and boats are large-ticket items, so shifts in those markets move the aggregate substantially. A strong year for RV sales registers as growth in the outdoor recreation economy without anyone spending more time outdoors, which is worth remembering before reading the total as a measure of behaviour.

What the Screen Time Data Says

The narrative usually accompanying these figures holds that people are reducing screen time in favour of physical activity. That part does not survive contact with the measurements.

Average daily screen time among younger cohorts rose rather than fell in recent measurement, and feature phone sales remain a small and declining share of handsets in developed markets. The desire to disconnect is widely reported in surveys; the behaviour change is not showing up in the usage data.

Both things can be true simultaneously, and probably are. People can spend more money on outdoor equipment and experiences while also spending more time on their phones — the two compete for different parts of a week, and there is no accounting identity forcing one to fall as the other rises.

What Is Actually Being Measured

Being precise about what these figures capture is the difference between a useful reading and a misleading one.

The satellite account measures economic activity associated with outdoor recreation in current dollars. It does not measure hours spent outdoors, number of participants, or whether anyone reduced screen use. A sector can grow 9% in a year in which participation is flat and prices rose.

Park visitation measures something narrower and more concrete: how many recreation visits occurred at National Park Service sites. It is a genuine count of behaviour, which is precisely why the 2.7% decline is worth taking seriously rather than explaining away.

The defensible summary is that Americans are spending more money on outdoor recreation and did not visit national parks more often. That is a real and substantial economic trend, and it is a weaker claim than a cultural turn away from screens.

Conclusion

The outdoor recreation economy is real, large and growing. Value added reached $696.7 billion in 2024, up from $639.5 billion, rising from 2.3% to 2.4% of GDP — which means it outgrew the wider economy — and it supports around 5 million jobs concentrated in places with few alternatives.

The behavioural claim is weaker than the economic one. National park visits fell 2.7% in 2025 to 323 million after 2024's record 331.9 million, and screen time among younger cohorts has been rising rather than falling.

Both can hold together if spending per participant is rising, activity is shifting away from national parks specifically, or prices are doing some of the work. All three are plausible and the data cannot separate them.

The distinction worth keeping is between dollars and hours. A satellite account measuring current-dollar value added tells you what people bought. It does not tell you how they spent their time, and the figures that do measure time are not moving in the direction the story requires.

Data Source and Attribution

US Bureau of Economic AnalysisBEA 2024 statisticsNational Park Service

Outdoor recreation value added, GDP share and year-on-year comparisons come from the US Bureau of Economic Analysis Outdoor Recreation Satellite Account for 2023 and 2024, measured in current dollars. Employment figures reflect published estimates for the sector. National park visitation figures come from National Park Service recreation visit statistics for 2024 and 2025. Gross output and value added are distinct measures and are distinguished in the text.

FactsFigs reviews, cleans, and cross-checks every source dataset before shaping it into a data story. Each visualization is created and designed in FactsFigs Design Studio — an internal tool developed and owned by FactsFigs — and is the original work of a FactsFigs author, not an AI-generated copy of any existing graphic. Individual assets within a visual may or may not be produced with AI tools, but the design of the visual itself is solely FactsFigs' own.

Figures are estimates at the time of publication, provided for information only — nothing here is financial advice or a guarantee of accuracy.

2026-07-20