Rural tourism is a key industry promoted across regions in China and serves as a crucial driver for rural revitalization, socioeconomic development, and common prosperity. Assessing the development level of rural tourism and identifying the contributions of different indicators are essential for fostering sustainable growth. Based on provincial-level data from 2012 to 2023, this study constructs an evaluation index system for rural tourism development in China. Using the entropy method as a foundation, the SVR and SHAP algorithms are applied to reassess the relative importance of influencing variables. The results show that (1) overall, the level of rural tourism development in China exhibited an upward trend during 2012-2023, with a temporary decline observed in 2020. (2) In terms of dimensional scores, Tourism Assets contributed the most and increased the fastest, while Supportive Services showed a relatively stable but gradual rise, and Environmental Factors together with Supportive Services remained weak links in the rural tourism system. (3) regarding associated factors, the key drivers influencing rural tourism development include the number of traditional villages, the number of China’s beautiful leisure villages, forest coverage rate, and the number of employees in travel agencies. Accordingly, policy recommendations are proposed in four areas: prioritizing the protection and revitalization of traditional villages, strengthening the brand of beautiful leisure villages, improving service quality and organizational supply, and promoting differentiated regional development strategies.
