Sustainable tourism is tourism that minimizes the costs and maximizes the benefits of tourism for natural environments and local communities, and can be carried out indefinitely without harming the resources on which it depends.

Sustainable tourism is built on three core pillars: environmental protection, social equity, and economic viability. The primary goal is to minimize the negative impacts of travel while maximizing the benefits for local communities and ecosystems. Key concepts include carrying capacity, which involves limiting the number of visitors to a site to prevent environmental degradation or cultural erosion. Another major concept is socio-cultural authenticity, ensuring that tourism respects and preserves the traditional values and heritage of host communities. From an environmental standpoint, it emphasizes the optimal use of resources, reducing waste, and protecting biodiversity. Economic sustainability focuses on ensuring that tourism revenue stays within the local community (preventing "leakage") to provide long-term employment and infrastructure improvements. In 2026, sustainable tourism also increasingly incorporates resilience, preparing destinations to adapt to climate change and global shifts. Ultimately, it is about creating a "virtuous cycle" where the act of visiting a place helps to fund its preservation and the well-being of the people who live there for future generations.