With 84 million tourists during 2023, Spain has become the leading tourist destination in the world, surpassing France in arrivals, according to estimates by Caixabank Research in its latest report Balance and prospects of the tourism sector that has just been published.
The French Ministry of Tourism puts the number of tourists in the Gallic country last year in a range between 78 and 82 million travelers.
In addition, among the top 10 global tourism recipients, Spain was the second destination to exceed the number of pre-COVID international tourists. The first was Turkey.
The Caixabank Research report highlights the strong increase in tourists from the United States, with almost 40% more arrivals than in 2022 and more than 16% compared to 2019.
"Tourism from the European Union modestly exceeded 2019 levels, due to the weakness of the Nordic countries, affected by an unfavorable exchange rate, and Germany.
In contrast, British tourism, which started the year with somewhat modest records, has been taking off throughout 2023.
Increased tourist spending
The recovery of international tourist arrivals, together with high inflation, has boosted tourist spending. Thus, between January and November 2023, international tourist spending exceeded the 2019 figure by 16.6%.
Domestic tourism, for its part, also performed well in 2023: in the first three quarters of the year, domestic spending exceeded the figure for the same dates in 2019 by 22.2%.
This data reflects that Spanish tourists have taken longer to go abroad than international tourists to return to Spain. But it also implies a downward bias for the short-term growth of domestic tourism, as Spaniards' departures abroad normalize.