Tourists spend 8.1 million nights in Malta during first half of 2023

In the first half of 2023, Malta has already welcomed over a million tourists, who’ve collectively contributed over a billion euros to the economy over the course of spending 8.1 million nights in the country.

Data made available by National Statistics Office (NSO) shows that Malta hit a new record with the number of inbound tourists arriving to the country for the month of June. The country welcomed 294,488 tourists during the month in 2023, a 20 per cent increase over the previous year, and a five per cent increase over the pre-COVID-19 peak of 2019.

A total of 267,585 inbound tourists visited Malta for holiday purposes, while 15,060 tourists came for business purposes. The rest arrived for educational, religious and health purposes.

Compared to the previous year, total nights spent went up by 22.4 per cent, surpassing 1.9 million nights. The largest share of guest nights (87.4 per cent) were spent in rented accomodation establishments.

Due to a larger increase of nights spent relative to the number of inbound tourists, the average length of stay nudged up to 6.6 nights, however was still below the 2019 figure of 6.9 nights.

Meanwhile, tourist expenditure reached 286.45 million for the month of June, a 31.1 per cent increase over the corresponding month in 2022, resulting in an average expenditure per night estimated at €147.2 per tourist.

The largest share of inbound tourists were aged between 25 and 444 (40.9 per cent) followed by the 45-64 age bracket (29.6 per cent). Residents from the UK, Italy and France made up 47 per cent of all inbound tourists.

Looking back at all the monthly figures for the first six months of the year, the number of tourists Malta received amounted to 1,289,292, an increase of 43.8 per cent over the same period in 2022. Total nights spent increased by 35.9 per cent to 8.1 million.

As a result, tourist expenditure was estimated at 1.036 billion for the first six months of 2023, a 48.8 per cent increase over 2022. Total expenditure per capita increase to €804 from €777.