Digital cultural tourism is an important part of the digital economy and digital China. The development of rural digital cultural tourism is an important engine for implementing the strategy of rural revitalization and leading the high-quality development of China’s rural tourism in the new era, which helps to promote the coupling and coordinated development of the high-quality development of rural tourism and common prosperity. This study examines the opportunities and challenges in using digital cultural tourism to promote rural revitalization, discusses the mechanism and model for enabling the common prosperity of the rural digital cultural tourism industry to achieve digital cultural tourism in the promotion of rural revitalization, and finally proposes a development path. The findings indicate that: (1) Digital cultural tourism has emerged as a significant force behind the growth of the rural tourism sector, and is a key route for achieving the objective of rural revitalization. (2) Digital cultural tourism and rural revitalization have mutually beneficial relationships; digital cultural tourism enables rural revitalization, and rural revitalization unlocks digital cultural tourism’s development potential, resulting in a positive interaction mechanism. (3) Four models of digital cultural tourism promoting rural revitalization are proposed, considering the rural classification scheme and related research. They are the digital cultural tourism for urban-rural integration and revitalization model, the digital cultural tourism for characteristic village revitalization model, the digital cultural tourism for agriculture, culture and tourism integration and revitalization model, and the digital cultural tourism for arts revitalization model. (4) To thoroughly promote the development of the rural digital cultural tourist sector, it should adhere to the product as the core, digital technology as the foundation, talent revitalization as the leader, and policy as the guarantee. The findings of this study enrich the research findings in digital cultural tourism and rural revitalization, which can serve as theoretical references and a practical foundation for the development of digital cultural tourism to empower rural revitalization.

Rural tourism plays a crucial role in promoting rural revitalization and offers excellent opportunities for high-quality development. This study presents a coupling coordination model with Hunan Province as a case study. The model utilizes IAHP (Improved Analytic Hierarchy Process) and trophy-weighted TOPSIS (Technique for Order Preference by Similarity to Solution) to evaluate the dynamic evolution process of the coupling coordination between rural tourism and rural revitalization from 2010 to 2019. Additionally, it explores the dominant factors and driving mechanisms that impact the coupling of this system. The results demonstrate that the rural tourism and rural revitalization indices in Hunan Province increased significantly from 2010 to 2019, whereas the relative priority of tourism gradually declined. The degree of coupling between rural tourism and rural revitalization increased from 0.3 to 0.96 and progressed through three stages: low-level coupling, adjustment, and high-level coupling. The degree of coupling coordination has increased from 0.22 to 0.89. This increase can be divided into four stages: moderately imbalanced with a dual-low index, a transitional stage with a lower index, initial coordination with a moderate index, and relatively good coordination prioritizing revitalization. The relationship between rural tourism and rural revitalization is affected by factors, such as local general public budget revenue, rural tourism satisfaction, road network density, agricultural production conditions, the processing rate of agricultural products, and the Engel coefficient of rural residents. Effective approaches to improve coupling coordination include strengthening financial support, optimizing service facilities, and promoting industrial integration.

Metropolitan areas are an inevitable outcome of urbanization development. The countryside is the key problem restricting the quality of urbanization development in such areas. Rural tourism-driven revitalization is of considerable importance for the integrated development of urban and rural areas in metropolitan areas. Based on comprehensive development level and coupling coordination degree models, we used the fuzzy comprehensive evaluation method to calculate the coupling and coordinated development level of rural tourism and revitalization in the metropolitan area of Xi’an in 2021. Furthermore, we explored the dynamic mechanism of coordinated development in combination with typical cases. The results indicate the following: (1) In 2021, the overall level of rural tourism development was good, and the spatial difference exhibited a decreasing phenomenon from the core circle to the outer circle. (2) The coupling and coordination degree of rural tourism and revitalization is generally in a balanced state, which indicates that the core circle is superior to the peripheral circle in space. (3) The combined effect of “supply-demand-guarantee” is an important driving mechanism for the coordinated development of rural tourism and revitalization in the metropolitan area, in which “supply” is the basic factor for the coordinated development, “demand” is the core factor for the improvement of its coupling coordination level, and “guarantee” is the supporting factor for its sustainable development. This study enriches the theory of rural revitalization in metropolitan areas to a certain extent and provides new insights for improving the quality of urban and rural integrated development in metropolitan areas.

This study constructed the RMPP (Resource-Market-Product-Policy) theory from the perspective of rural revitalization, combined with the concept of intangible cultural heritage (ICH)+tourism to assist rural revitalization. Firstly, the study summarized the current situation of integrated development of ICH resources and tourism in 10 suburban districts of Beijing from four dimensions: Resources, market, product, and policy. Secondly, the study used the Delphi method and Analytic Hierarchy Process to construct an RMPP evaluation index system, determine the weights of the indicators, and score them. Through evaluation and analysis, the development differences of the 10 suburban districts in the four dimensions of RMPP were identified, and the difficulties in integrating development of ICH and tourism were sorted out, such as weak awareness of ICH inheritance, insufficient integration of ICH tourism resources, low level of the development of ICH tourism products, and unclear rights and responsibilities for ICH protection. Finally, the study explored the path of promoting rural revitalization through the integration of ICH and tourism from the four dimensions of RMPP, including scientific integration of ICH resources, innovative market models, product gradient development, and policy targeted implementation.

Location choice and decision-making are the basic and critical issues in economic investment. Given the rapid development of rural tourism, scientific decision-making on rural tourism investment (RTI) plays a vitally important role in local industrial efficiency and achievements. To learn the connotation of RTI and enrich our knowledge on the evolutionary characteristics of its location choice factors in destination phased development, this paper has comprehensively analysed RTI and built a location choice factor system from the perspective of the human-land relationship system based on an empirical study of Zhejiang Province in China. (1) According to human-land relationship theory, RTI is constructed by a systematic content of “investors-factors-objects”, and its location choice is related to the local industrial economy, social and cultural development, and natural environment. (2) Contributions of location choice factors present a clear decreasing trend among the industrial economy, social and cultural conditions, and natural environment to RTI decision-making in the study area, while the industrial economy gradually stands out with rural tourism destination evolution successively from the initial stage, development stage, and rapid expansion stage to the upgrading and efficiency improvement stage. (3) Evolution of RTI location choice is a process of making different investment decisions in various regional rural tourism development stages, as the rural human-land relationship system has a deep influence on RTI earning expectations and “investors-factors-objects”.