The problem of human development in tourism is one of the least studied. In a modern, innovative model of tourism within the experience economy, the motives and interests of customers, the life experience of a traveling person as a developing person, are leading in the development, implementation and evaluation of tours. The purpose of the study is to analyze the problems, opportunities and limitations of human development by means of tourist travel. The article presents the results of a theoretical study of the problem of human development by means of tourist travel, it is shown that without special efforts in many types of tourism the developing potential of organized and "wild" travel is updated weekly, is not used, groups of general, special and special methods of human development in tourism are identified. In modern tourism, two trends in human development collide: to the development and improvement of man and culture, including tourism, and to the degradation of man and culture. This underlines the urgency of organizing and implementing programs and technologies of psychological and pedagogical support for individual tourists and tourism in general, starting from traditional consumerist-oriented mass tourism programs, including niche tours of interest, and ending with adventure tours (development activation). Tourism is a way of introducing a Homo tornus to the civilizational heritage and a way of transforming oneself as a person, partner, student and professional. Scattered impressions offered by tourism as an agent of the “cultural industry” are a significantly smaller resource for human development than involvement in the thousand-year experience of the formation and development of mankind. A person who is familiar with the civilizational heritage of his country and humanity is capable and ready to become and develop as a subject of culture, not only to exist as an object facing uncontrollable events from outside.