Stays increase by 4.1% to November, totalling 76 million
Overnight stays in Portugal’s tourist accommodation sector just keep rising.
Taken from January to November, they increased by 4.1% – to over 76 million, with increases of 2.5% for residents and 4.8% for non-residents.
But taken solely for the month of November, the results have been fairly astounding.
According to INE (national statistics institute) rapid statistics on tourist activity in November, the tourist accommodation sector recorded 2.2 million guests and 5.0 million overnight stays – corresponding to year-on-year increases of 14.0% and 9.8% respectively (+3.7% and +2.5% in October 2024, in the same order).
INE also highlights the ‘expressive increase’ in overnight stays from residents, which rose by 22.2% in November, after a 0.9% increase in October, corresponding to 1.7 million – while overnight stays from non-residents recorded a ‘more modest growth’ of 4.6%, after a 3.1% increase in October, totalling 3.4 million.
In foreign markets, the UK remains the main source market (14.7% share), growing by 0.3% in November, followed by Germany (12.5% share), which increased by 2.1%.
Overnight stays from the German market, the second main inbound market in November (12.5% of the total), increased by 2.1%, followed by the North American market in third place (9.9% share), with growth of 11.2%.
Among the 10 main inbound markets in November, the Polish market stood out with the biggest increase (+15.9%), followed by Canada (12.4%) and the Netherlands (+11.9%). On the other hand, the French market recorded the biggest decrease (-3.%).
In November, all regions recorded an increase in overnight stays, with the largest increases occurring in the Centre (+24.%), the Setúbal Peninsula (+19.3%), the North (+18.3%) and the Autonomous Region of the Azores (+16.4%).
The Algarve and Greater Lisbon showed the lowest growth (+3.5 % and +4.1 %, respectively).
According to INE, overnight stays from residents increased in all regions, most significantly in Madeira (+46.8%), the Centre (+29.9%), the Alentejo (+24.7%) and the North (+24.3%).
Overnight stays from non-residents increased in all regions except for the Alentejo (-2.5 %), with the greatest increases in the Setúbal Peninsula (+21.9 %) and the Azores (+20.5 %).
INE’s data also shows that the average stay in tourist accommodation establishments in November (2.32 nights) continued to fall (-3.6%, after -1.2% in October).
The highest values for this indicator continued to be seen in Madeira (4.66 nights) and the Algarve (3.47 nights), while the shortest stays occurred in the Centre (1.68 nights) and the West and Tejo Valley (1.69 nights).
In November, the average stay of residents (1.75 nights) increased by 0.3% and that of non-residents (2.76 nights) decreased by 3.6%, the latter being longer than that of residents in all regions.
Madeira recorded the longest average stays for non-residents (5.13 nights) and residents (3.16 nights).
As for net bed occupancy rate in tourist accommodation establishments (37.7%), it increased by 1.4 percentage points in November after falling by 0.2 points in October, while the net room occupancy rate (49.0%) grew by 2.0 percentage points (+1.1 percentage points in October).
In the month under review, the largest increases were seen in the Setúbal Peninsula (+5.4 percentage points) and the Centre (+4%). In comparison, the Algarve was the only region to fall in this indicator (-0.8 percentage points).
The highest bed occupancy rates were in Madeira (63.5%), followed by Greater Lisbon (51.0%), while the lowest were in the Alentejo (26.3%) and the Algarve (27.1%).
Source: LUSA
