Inbound visits and spend: monthly, UK

• Visits: A strong October but a sluggish November and December brought Q4 2023 visits below 2019 levels. Provisional visits in 2023 totalled at 37.9m visits, down 7% vs 2019 (and in line with VisitBritain’s forecast).

• Spend: A record spend for October but weaker November and December saw Q4 just below 2019 levels but across 2023, visitors spent a record £30.9bn, up 9% vs 2019 (just below VisitBritain’s forecast). In real terms, visitor spending was down 10% vs 2019 (and up 9% vs 2022).

• Journey purpose: In 2023, visits to friends/relatives (VFR) was the only journey purpose to surpass 2019 levels with holiday and miscellaneous visits just below 2019 and business visits down by one quarter. However, looking at growth vs 2022, VFR visits are showing a slowdown in growth whilst other journey purposes are recovering at a faster rate.

• Global regions: North America visits dipped in December but overall saw record visits in 2023. European visits were around one tenth below pre-pandemic levels at the annual level whilst the Rest of World was further behind at -17%.

The International Passenger Survey (IPS) is a continuous survey carried out by the Office for National Statistics (ONS). It covers all major air, sea and tunnel ports, providing detailed information on the numbers and types of visits made by people travelling to and from the UK.

From January to June 2022, the ONS was unable to restart interviewing at Eurotunnel due to COVID-19 restrictions, so data for those travelling via this port is excluded for this time period. Interviewing at Eurostar was not affected by COVID-19 restrictions during this period. The ONS restarted IPS interviews at all ports from July 2022.

Please see About IPS for further information and the ONS.