22% of tourists to Spain in February were British, data shows

Spain has enjoyed another strong start to the year in terms of its excellent tourism industry.

British holidaymakers flocked to Spain in their droves in February, comprising 22 per cent – more than one in five – of all foreign visitors to the country for the month, data from the Spanish National Statistics Institute (INE) has revealed.

In total, February saw 3.7 million tourists visit Spain, of which 807,000 came from the UK. Overall, this figure amounted to a 13.7 per cent increase on the same month in 2015, highlighting Spain’s enduring and growing popularity as Europe’s leading holiday destination. For British visitors, the increase was even sharper at 17.1 per cent…

After the Brits came the French, who numbered 530,000 and grew in volume by 8.5 per cent on last year, while the 481,000 Germans who visited Spain in February this year was 7.4 per cent higher than in 2015.

Significantly, the largest growth came from Russia, with Russian visitor numbers up 19.8 per cent on last year. This data suggests that the Russian economy is finding its feet again after a turbulent 18 months. Visitor numbers from the USA were up 18.4 per cent, and Irish visitors were also up significantly for the month, growing 17.3 per cent on 2015.

For 2016 so far, the data from INE collates both January and February figures and presents an encouraging picture, revealing that the 7.2 million tourists recorded in Spain this year is 12.5 per cent higher than the same period in 2015. Again, Brits lead the way, providing 1.51 million of those visitors, which represents a year-over-year increase of 16.7 per cent.

Recent terrorism troubles in rival resorts such as Turkey, Tunisia and Egypt have played a role in boosting Spain’s numbers, while the ongoing economic crisis in Greece has certainly deterred visitors to the country over the past few months.

Spain has been a willing recipient of this uptick in visitors, as the INE data shows. By region, the ever-popular winter sun destinations in the Canary Islands have attracted the largest number of visitors – just over 2.1 million so far this year – with the Costa del Sol’s Andalucía not far behind with slightly more than one million visitors: a figure that represents a healthy 17.4 per cent increase on 2015.