Tourist arrivals in Maldives surpasses 800,000

The number of inbound tourists in to the Maldives for the year 2024 has passed the 800,000 mark, recording a 12 percent increase from last year.

According to the latests statistics shared by Maldives' Ministry of Tourism, the biggest market for the country's tourism industry is in China. As of 5th May, 87,566 Chinese tourists visited the Maldives in this year alone, occupying 11 percent of the market share. This is followed by Russia, which holds 10.1 percent market share with a total of 80,698 tourists.

Other major markets include the United Kingdom (77,272 tourists and 9.7 percent market share), Italy (71,692 tourists and 9.0 percent market share), and Germany (62,365 tourists and 7.8 percent market share).

India, France, the United States of America, Switzerland and Poland also made it onto the top 10 markets this year.

In comparison to the first four months of 2022 and 2023, the industry has maintained an upward trend, topping arrival figures from both years each month.

According to arrival data, 192,385 tourist arrivals were recorded, while February saw the highest number of arrivals in a single month in the past three years, with a record number of 217,392 arrivals. However, March and April saw a slight decline in arrivals with 194,227 and 168,647 inbound tourists respectively. In May, 25,959 arrivals were recorded during the first five days alone.

This is an average of 6,338 tourists every day this year.

If this trend continues, Maldives is expected to celebrate its 1 millionth visitor within the next one and half month.

Maldives is currently working on reaching a target tourist arrival of 2 million by the end of this year.

Maldives' tourism sector - which heavily contributes to the country's economy - is famous for its 'one island, one resort' concept which means an entire island is one resort. This concept has been credited as one of the reasons why the industry, and the country's economy was able to quickly bounce back during the Covid-19 pandemic, at a time when isolation was crucial.

However, Maldives' also offers diverse travel options for visitors on various budgets, thanks to the increasing availability of island hotels, guest houses and safari vessels.