Which EU regions are receiving the most foreign tourists?

In 2023, the number of people travelling abroad for tourism had fully recovered from the impact of the COVID-19 crisis, with restrictions lifted for all destinations. The 3 EU regions at level 2 of the nomenclature of territorial units for statistics (NUTS 2) with the highest number of nights spent by foreign tourists were the Spanish island regions of Canarias (83.2 million) and Illes Balears (61.7 million) and the Croatian coastal region of Jadranska Hrvatska (80.8 million). These three regions account for 16.4% of the total nights spent by foreigners in the EU.

Besides these 3, the top 10 regions with the highest values included the Spanish regions of Cataluña and Andalucia, two island regions of Greece (Notio Aigaio, Kriti), the French capital region of Ile-de-France, Veneto in Italy and Tirol in Austria, respectively. The top 10 tourist destinations represent more than one-third (37.6%) of the foreign nights spent in the EU in 2023.

In 58 regions out of 231 for which data are available the number of nights spent by foreign tourists was higher than that recorded for domestic tourists. The relative importance of foreign tourists was particularly high in 7 popular holiday destinations that accounted for more than 9 out of every 10 nights spent in tourist accommodation: the Greek island regions of Kriti (94.6%), Ionia Nisia (93.6%) and Notio Aigaio (92.0%), Malta (93.1%), Jadranska Hrvatska (92.5%), Cyprus (90.8%) and Tirol (90.7%). 

These regions more dependent on foreign tourism are visible on the map in the green shade bubbles.

Source dataset: tour_occ_nin3

The bubbles in yellow, gold and brown refer to regions more dependent on domestic tourism. 

In 2023, the 3 regions in the EU with the highest number of nights spent in tourist accommodation by domestic tourists were all in France: the capital region of Ile-de-France (39.7 million), Rhône-Alpes (38.7 million) and Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur (37.8 million). There were 4 more French regions – Languedoc-Roussillon, Aquitaine, Pays de la Loire and Bretagne – present among the 16 EU regions that had more than 20.0 million nights spent by domestic tourists.

Would you like to know more about tourism across EU regions?

The article is based on the Regions in Europe 2024 interactive edition, tourism chapter.

You can read more about tourism in the Eurostat regional yearbook – 2024 edition  also available as a set of Statistics Explained articles. 

The corresponding maps in the Statistical Atlas provide a full-screen interactive map.