Bank of Greece report: More than 30 million tourists visit the country during 2023

Based on final data by the Bank of Greece, the balance of travel services in 2023 posted a surplus of €18,162.0 million, up by 15.3% from a surplus of €15,751.5 million in 2022. This development was due to a larger increase in travel receipts (up by €2,917.5 million or 16.5%) than in travel payments (up by €507.0 million or 26.3%) - Chart 1. The year-on-year rise in travel receipts was driven by a 20.8% increase in the number of non-resident inbound travellers, as well as by a rise in average expenditure per overnight stay by €6.9 or 8.6% (2023: €87.2, 2022: €80.3) - Table 1.

In greater detail, the average expenditure per trip declined by 3.5% (2023: €570.7, 2022: €591.7) and the average length of stay fell by 11.2% to 6.5 nights (2022: 7.4 nights). Total overnight stays - Table 5 - increased by 7.3% to 236,271.2 thousand in 2023 from 220,213.1 thousand in 2022.

Travel receipts

Travel receipts in 2023 totalled €20,593.6 million, up by 16.5% compared with 2022. This development was driven by an 11.6% increase in receipts from residents of the EU27, which stood at €11,169.7 million or 54.2% of total travel receipts, and by an 18.3% rise in receipts from other country residents to €8,576.6 million - Table 2 and Chart 2.

In more detail, receipts from euro-area residents increased by 12.5% year-on-year to €9,065.7 million in 2023, while receipts from residents of non-euro area EU27 countries increased by 8.0% to €2,104.0 million.

Among major countries of origin, receipts from Germany rose by 9.7% to €3,571.3 million and receipts from France rose by 11.6% to €1,425.4 million. Turning to other countries, receipts from the United Kingdom grew by 5.3% to €3,294.4 million. Receipts from the United States increased by 14.4% to €1,373.6 million, whereas receipts from Russia dropped by 21.7% to €32.4 million.  

Travel receipts by trip purpose

Looking at the breakdown of non-residents’ expenditure in Greece by trip purpose, trips for personal reasons represented the bulk of total travel receipts in 2023, with a share of 94.7%, up from 94.6% in 2022, while the corresponding receipts increased by 16.6%. Within this category, leisure accounted for the largest share in total travel receipts (2023: 87.9%, 2022: 85.3%), with the corresponding receipts rising by 20.1% year-on-year to €18,100.8 million. Receipts from trips for the purpose of visiting family declined by 15.9% and their share in total travel receipts fell to 4.4% from 6.1% in 2022. Receipts from trips for health purposes also dropped by 40.0% to €37.0 million. Finally, receipts from business trips rose by 15.6%, with their share in total receipts standing at 5.3% (2022: 5.4%) - Table 3 and Chart 3.

Inbound traveller flows

As already mentioned, the number of inbound travellers in 2023 rose by 20.8% to 36,082.7 thousand, from 29,875.8 thousand in 2022. Specifically, traveller flows through airports grew by 12.7%, while traveller flows through road border-crossing points increased by 34.9%. Travellers from within the EU27 accounted for 54.4% of the total number of travellers, while travellers from other countries accounted for 36.3%[1]. In 2023, travellers from within the EU27 increased by 15.6% compared with 2022. This development is attributed to increases in the number of travellers from euro-area countries by 11.3% to 12,913.2 thousand and in the number of travellers from non-euro area EU27 countries by 24.7% to 6,727.7 thousand. More specifically, travellers from Germany increased by 9.5% to 4,764.2 thousand and travellers from Italy increased by 30.4% to 1,842.3 thousand. Travellers from France also increased, by 4.2% to 1,831.0 thousand.

Finally, the number of travellers from other countries grew by 20.8% to 13,094.2 thousand. Specifically, the number of travellers from the United Kingdom rose by 2.4% to 4,591.7 thousand. Travellers from the United States increased by 29.2% to 1,406.5 thousand, whereas travellers from Russia declined by 1.0% to 35.7 thousand.

Overnight stays

In 2023, non-residents’ overnight stays in Greece totalled 236,271.2 thousand, up by 7.3% from 220,213.1 thousand in 2022. This was driven by a 1.5% increase in nights spent by residents of the EU27, as well as by a 10.8% rise in nights spent by residents of other countries. The rise in overnight stays by residents of the EU27 reflects a 2.6% increase in nights spent by euro-area residents, as nights spent by residents of non-euro area EU27 countries fell by 2.1%. The number of overnight stays did not change significantly from 2022 for German residents, while it increased by 33.3% for Italian residents and declined by 1.5% for French residents. Turning to other countries, the number of overnight stays by UK residents dropped by 5.2%, while the number of overnight stays by US residents rose by 23.1%. Finally, overnight stays by Russian residents increased by 8.5% - Table 5 and Chart 5.   

Cruises

Since 2012, the Bank of Greece has conducted a cruise-specific survey (“Cruise Survey”) in order to enrich the data collected through its Border Survey. Following a standardised methodology[3], detailed cruise data for 2023 were collected at 16 Greek ports, covering 83.7% of all cruise ship arrivals in Greece.

Total receipts from cruise passengers in 2023 rose by 84.1% year-on-year to €908.4 million. Of this amount, €61.0 million were already captured in the Border Survey data, as they represent receipts from last port travellers, eventually leaving the country, while the remaining €847.4 million concern additional receipts data recorded by the Cruise Survey - Tables 6 and 7.

Chart 6 shows a breakdown of cruise receipts by port. The port of Piraeus ranks first with a share of 47.8% in total receipts, followed by the port of Corfu with 13.3% and the port of Santorini with 8.5% respectively.

The year under review saw 5,152 cruise ship arrivals (2022: 4,598). Total overnight stays ashore rose by 121.5% year-on-year to 9,421.9 thousand in 2023, with a positive impact on cruise receipts. The total number of cruise passengers also rose year-on-year, by 61.1% to an estimated 3,484.1 thousand - Table 7.

Chart 7 shows a breakdown of cruise ship arrivals by port. The port of Santorini ranks first with a share of 15.5% in total cruise ship arrivals, followed by the port of Piraeus with 14.8% and the port of Mykonos with 14.5% respectively.

In 2023, the total number of cruise passenger visits rose by 55.0% to 6,964.2 thousand, from 4,493.6 thousand in 2022 - Table 8. According to the Cruise Survey, 83.6% of all cruise passengers were transit visitors, with an average of 2.0 stopovers at Greek ports of call. The seven most important cruise ship ports account for 90.8% of total cruise receipts and 82.7% of total cruise passenger visits.   

Balance of travel services by region

As suggested by the Border Survey, travel receipts in 2023 amounted to €19,746.3 million. Five regions accounted for the bulk (90.5%) of total receipts - Table 9 - namely: the Southern Aegean (€5,340.8 million), Crete (€5,196.3 million), Attica (€3,786.9 million), the Ionian Islands (€2,038.8 million) and Central Macedonia (€1,514.8 million). The remaining regions (the Peloponnese, Eastern Macedonia and Thrace, Epirus, Thessaly, Western Greece, Central Greece, the Northern Aegean and Western Macedonia) together accounted for €1,868.6 million.

Visits to Greece (all 13 regions combined) in 2023 totalled 36,135.6 thousand. The number of visits exceeds the number of inbound travellers estimated by the Border Survey (32,735.2 thousand), as travellers may visit more than one region in the course of one trip.

The five most visited regions, accounting for 83.9% of total visits, were: Attica (7,888.7 thousand visits), the Southern Aegean (6,960.7 thousand), Central Macedonia (6,565.9 thousand), Crete (5,521.7 thousand) and the Ionian Islands (3,377.9 thousand). The remaining regions (Epirus, Eastern Macedonia and Thrace, the Peloponnese, Thessaly, Western Greece, Central Greece, the Northern Aegean and Western Macedonia) together accounted for 5,820.6 thousand visits.

The number of overnight stays in Greece in the period under review totalled 227,937.7 thousand. According to the breakdown into the 13 regions, five regions accounted for 87.7% of total overnight stays, namely: the Southern Aegean (50,643.4 thousand nights), Crete (45,837.2 thousand), Attica (44,347.7 thousand), the Central Macedonia (32,272.1 thousand) and the Ionian Islands (26,914.9 thousand). The remaining regions (Eastern Macedonia and Thrace, the Peloponnese, Epirus, Thessaly, Western Greece, Central Greece, the Northern Aegean and Western Macedonia) together accounted for 27,922.5 thousand overnight stays.

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