Number of tourists coming to Portugal reached new high in 2018
There was an increase in the number of nights spent - however, this increase was much less significant than in previous years, having basically stagnated if we look at the number of non-residents.
Portugal maintains its hype. Last year, it was the chosen destination for 21.051 million tourists (residents and non-residents). There was an increase in the number of nights spent — however, this increase was much less significant than in previous years, having basically stagnated if we look at the number of non-residents visiting the country. Profits went up, to €3.6BN, which accounted for a 6% growth.
While the total of guests increased by 1.7% year-on-year, reaching a new high, things were different if we looked exclusively at non-residents, which presented a year-on-year annual increase rate of 0.4% (12.7 million non-resident guests).
The majority of the international tourists spending nights in the country came from the United Kingdom (1.83 million), which still represented a fall in comparison to 2017 (dropped by 7.5%). It is a general belief that Brexit is contributing negatively to British tourism.
Spanish tourists were next, with 1.75 million tourists coming from right across the border, according to the Portuguese Office for National Statistics (INE).
This slowdown in the number of tourists is also backed up by the number of nights spent in 2018, which totalled 57.6 million last year, which meant there was no difference in comparison to the previous year — the number of nights spent by residents increased by 5%, while the number of nights spent by non-residents dropped 2%.
