In the initial 11 months of 2023, Dubai welcomed 15.37 million overnight international visitors, marking a yearly increase of approximately 20%. This surge reflected a robust recovery in the emirate’s tourism sector post-Covid-19. The performance during this period exceeded the 15 million international visitors recorded in the same timeframe in 2019, pre-pandemic, by 2.5%, according to data from Dubai’s Department of Economy and Tourism.
Dubai, experiencing a notable rise in tourism numbers, retained its position as the world’s most favored destination for holidaymakers for the second consecutive year in Tripadvisor’s 2023 Travellers’ Choice Awards.
During the third quarter of 2023, Dubai International Airport reported its highest quarterly traffic since 2019, with 22.9 million passengers. This contributed to a total of 64.5 million passengers for the first nine months, a significant 39.3% increase from the same period in 2022. Dubai Airports anticipated exceeding pre-coronavirus levels by the year-end, projecting a total of 86.8 million visitors, up from 86.4 million in 2019.
Breaking down the source markets, Western Europe led with 19% of the total international visitors, followed by South Asia at 18%. The GCC contributed 16%, while roughly two million tourists from Russia, the Commonwealth of Independent States, and Eastern Europe comprised 13% of the total.
Visitor distribution by region indicated that the Mena region constituted 12%, North and South-East Asia 9%, the Americas 7%, Australasia 2%, and Africa 4%.
This surge in tourist arrivals had a positive impact on hotel occupancy, reaching 77.2% on average from January to November, surpassing both the same period in 2022 (72.6%) and pre-Covid levels in 2019 (74.9%). Revenue per available room increased by 4% annually to Dh394 in the January to November period, marking a 30% rise compared to the corresponding period in 2019. On average, hotel guests stayed 3.8 nights, slightly below the four-night average in the same period in 2022 and 3.4 nights in the corresponding period in 2019.
