visitor arrivals
Information from the Statistics and Census Service (DSEC) indicated that visitor arrivals soared by 106.7% year-on-year to 3,293,564 in February 2024, recovering to 92.9% of the level in the same month of 2019; besides, the figure represented a rise of 15.1% month-on-month. Same-day visitors (1,867,660) and overnight visitors (1,425,904) leapt by 148.9% and 69.1% year-on-year respectively. Meanwhile, the average length of stay of visitors shortened by 0.2 day year-on-year to 1.1 days; the decrease was mainly caused by a slight increase in the proportion of same-day visitors in the total number of visitors. The average length of stay of overnight visitors (2.2 days) and same-day visitors (0.3 day) remained unchanged.
As regards source of visitors, visitors from mainland China jumped by 143.9% year-on-year to 2,449,243 in February, with those travelling under the Individual Visit Scheme (1,497,047) rising by 135.9%. Visitors from the nine Pearl River Delta cities in the Greater Bay Area hiked by 110.0% year-on-year to 1,159,170. In addition, visitors from Hong Kong (608,739) and Taiwan (59,390) grew by 16.3% and 165.0% year-on-year respectively. The numbers of visitors from mainland China, Hong Kong and Taiwan in February rebounded to 95.7%, 92.5% and 71.9% of the corresponding levels in the same month of 2019.
International visitors totalled 176,192 in February, back to 71.6% of the figure in the corresponding month of 2019. Regarding the Southeast Asian markets, numbers of visitors from the Philippines (39,837) and Indonesia (12,471) exceeded the February 2019 levels, rising by 26.2% and 3.2% respectively. Numbers of visitors from Malaysia (12,265) and Thailand (8,973) returned to 91.7% and 92.9% of the corresponding levels in February 2019. With respect to the Northeast Asian markets, numbers of visitors from the Republic of Korea (41,844) and Japan (11,442) recovered to 48.6% and 52.6% of the respective levels in the same month of 2019. As regards long-haul markets, visitors from the USA (9,903) rebounded to 70.0% of the February 2019 level.
Analysed by checkpoint, number of visitor arrivals by land hiked by 104.2% year-on-year to 2,617,632 in February; among them, 46.6% arrived through the checkpoint of Border Gate (1,221,115), 29.0% came via the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge (758,428) and 17.5% via the Hengqin port (457,977). Meanwhile, visitor arrivals by sea (427,798) and by air (248,134) showed respective growth of 114.4% and 121.2% year-on-year.
In the first two months of 2024, number of visitor arrivals expanded by 105.8%year-on-year to 6,155,173; same-day visitors (3,347,758) and overnight visitors (2,807,415) jumped by 151.4% and 69.2% respectively. The average length of stay of visitors shortened by 0.2 day year-on-year to 1.2 days, with that of overnight visitors (2.2 days) decreasing by 0.2 day whereas that of same-day visitors (0.3 day) staying steady.