VisitBritain have upgraded their 2023 inbound tourism forecast.
Visits overall to the UK this year are now forecast to be 37.5 million, 92% of 2019 levels and inbound visitor spending £30.9 billion, up 9%.
The annual VisitBritain forecast for the volume and value of inbound tourism to the UK is issued towards the end of each year and revised mid-year after the final official inbound statistics are released.
Final 2022 data for the International Passenger Survey (IPS) was released by the Office for National Statistics on May 26th. In 2022, the UK welcomed 31.2m inbound visits following two years of extremely low visits due to the impact of COVID-19 (down 24% vs 2019).
In 2022, visitors spent £26.5bn during the 12 months of 2022, down 7% on 2019 (in nominal terms). Taking inflation into account, visitor spend was 17% below 2019 levels, equivalent to £23.5bn in 2019 prices. For more information and detailed data please visit this page.
VisitBritain’s latest inbound forecast for 2023 is 37.5 million visits, 92% of the 2019 level. Inbound visitors are forecast to spend £30.9 billion, 109% of the 2019 level in nominal terms although 90% in real terms (taking inflation into account).
This is an upgrade on the previous forecast, due to data for late 2022 coming in stronger than expected.
VisitBritain CEO Patricia Yates said:
“Our upgraded forecast is on the back of the stronger recovery we’re seeing, led by the USA with spending by American visitors up 42% to a record £6 billion last year alone. Spending by visitors from our major European markets including France and Spain is also coming back strongly, while East Asia including China, our second most valuable inbound market in 2019 worth £1.7 billion, is still well below pre-COVID levels.
“Our priority has been to rebuild visitor value and we’ve been competing hard in markets showing strong recovery with our multi-million pound GREAT Britain marketing campaigns and working with trade so British destinations are sold internationally. We’ve also been investing in separate campaigns in the USA with British Airways and a pilot cooperative marketing programme with industry, converting the interest to visit into bookings now, boosting spend across Britain.”
Photo credit: GREAT Britain & Northern Ireland Campaign @GREATBritain
