While the Balearic authorities do their best to promote tourism at the ITB Berlin travel fair in a very complicated trave climate, the figures for January do not make good reading. While Spain as a whole enjoyed a “record” month, international tourist arrivals in the Balearics fell by 8.83% in January, according to data published on Wednesday by the National Statistics Institute.
According to the INE, in the first month of the year, the Balearics recorded the arrival of 134,659 international tourists, with an increase in spending of 2.97% compared to January 2025, reaching 193 million euros. The average spend per person in January was 1,434 euros, an increase of 12.94%. Each tourist spent an average of €152 per day and trips lasted an average of 9.4 days.
By region, the most visited was the Canary Islands with 27.85% of all international tourists travelling to the country, followed by Catalonia (19.72%) and Madrid (14.95%). In January, Spain received 5.1 million international tourists, representing a 1.2% increase compared to the same month in 2025, while total spending by these visitors shot up 9.3% to €7.805 billion, according to data from the Frontur and Egatur surveys released on Wednesday by the National Statistics Institute (INE).
The 1.2% increase in the number of arrivals recorded in January contrasts with the 6.1% increase recorded in January last year, confirming a certain slowdown. By source market, the United Kingdom consolidated its position as the main source of tourists to Spain, with 897,095 travellers, up 3.3%. In contrast, flows from Germany and France fell by 2% (527,327 tourists) and 19.5% (517,788 tourists), respectively.
In terms of the type of trip, market accommodation rebounded by 5.4%, driven by the hotel sector (+7.3%), while rented accommodation grew by 0.8%. In contrast, non-market accommodation (houses of relatives or friends) fell by 9.9%. The majority of stays lasted between four and seven nights, with 2.2 million travellers (+2.1%). However, the flow of day trippers (without overnight stays) fell by 2.2% and long stays (more than 15 nights) fell by 9.1%. The INE also highlights the boom in package holidays, which grew by 9.5% to 1.1 million, compared to a slight decline of 0.9% in independent travel.
By destination, the Canary Islands led the way in terms of visitor numbers in January with 27.8% of the total (+4.9%), followed by Catalonia (19.7%) and the Community of Madrid (14.9%). However, performance was uneven: while Madrid grew by 8.8%, Catalonia recorded a 6.2% decline in the number of arrivals. In financial terms, total spending of €7.805 billion confirms the trend of higher profitability per visitor. According to the Ministry of Industry and Tourism, these figures support a model where ‘growth in spending at the destination remains above the rate of arrivals’.
On average, each tourist spent €1,522 per stay (+8%) and €177 per day (+7.1%). It should be noted that the increase in international spending (9.3%) was 8.2 percentage points higher than the increase in visitor numbers. The United Kingdom accounted for 13.9% of total spending, despite a 1.7% drop in its investment volume. Germany (10.6% of the total) increased its spending by 4.4%, while the Nordic countries (7%) reduced their contribution by 7.5%.
By category, spending on activities was the main item (23.4% of the total), with an increase of 7.9%. This was followed by international transport and accommodation, with increases of 10.2% and 15.7%, respectively. Hotels accounted for 53.9% of total spending in January, growing by 10.4% year-on-year.
Finally, leisure accounted for 76% of total expenditure for the month. By region, the Canary Islands accounted for 28.7% of total expenditure (+3.6%), although the highest growth was in the Community of Madrid (+15.6%) and Catalonia (+14.8%), which managed to offset the fall in tourist numbers with higher revenue.