Visitor arrivals
Information from the Statistics and Census Service (DSEC) indicated that visitor arrivals soared by 79.4% year-on-year to 8,875,757 in the first quarter of 2024, recovering to 85.7% of the figure in the same quarter of 2019. Same-day visitors (4,791,721) and overnight visitors (4,084,036) showed respective growth of 107.5% and 54.8% year-on-year. Meanwhile, the average length of stay of visitors decreased by 0.1 day year-on-year to 1.2 days; the duration for overnight visitors (2.2 days) went down by 0.1 day, while that for same-day visitors (0.3 day) held stable.
As regards source of visitors, visitors from mainland China jumped by 94.3% year-on-year to 6,291,912 in the first quarter, with those travelling under the Individual Visit Scheme (3,469,957) rising by 68.3%. Visitors from the nine Pearl River Delta cities in the Greater Bay Area (3,015,172), Hong Kong (1,817,903) and Taiwan (181,916) grew by 74.9%, 21.0% and 167.8% year-on-year respectively. The number of Hong Kong visitors in the first quarter showed a 1.4% rise compared to the same period in 2019, whereas the numbers of visitors from mainland China and Taiwan rebounded to 84.5% and 69.5% of the first-quarter levels in 2019.
International visitors totalled 584,026 in the first quarter, back to 68.2% of the figure in the same quarter of 2019. Regarding the Southeast Asian markets, number of visitors from the Philippines (114,625) rose by 23.7% over the same period in 2019. Number of visitors from Malaysia (39,839) returned to 70.8% of the 2019 first-quarter figure, while the numbers of visitors from Indonesia (39,294) and Thailand (38,638) both rebounded to 89.2% of their respective levels. With respect to the Northeast Asian markets, numbers of visitors from the Republic of Korea (129,519) and Japan (36,129) recovered to 49.4% and 40.6% of the corresponding levels in the same quarter of 2019. As regards long-haul markets, visitors from the USA (33,383) rebounded to 66.5% of the 2019 first-quarter level.
Analysed by checkpoint, number of visitor arrivals by land hiked by 75.9% year-on-year to 7,021,019 in the first quarter; among them, 47.5% arrived through the checkpoint of Border Gate (3,337,101), 31.6% came via the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge (2,220,120) and 14.8% via the Hengqin port (1,041,291). Meanwhile, visitor arrivals by sea (1,118,074) and by air (736,664) surged by 81.2% and 117.6% year-on-year respectively.
In March 2024, number of visitor arrivals expanded by 39.0% year-on-year to 2,720,584, recovering to 80.3% of the level in the same month in 2019; however, the figure represented a month-on-month drop of 17.4%. Same-day visitors (1,443,963) and overnight visitors (1,276,621) grew by 47.7% and 30.4% year-on-year respectively. The average length of stay of visitors remained at 1.2 days, with that of overnight visitors (2.3 days) increasing by 0.1 day year-on-year whereas that of same-day visitors (0.2 day) decreasing by 0.1 day.