Since border reopening, Maldives recorded the highest single-day tourist arrival rate, with nearly 3,000 arrivals on Saturday.

Tourism Minister Dr. Abdulla Mausoom announced this via Twitter, revealing that over 2,900 tourist arrivals were recorded on Saturday “in just 20 weeks” after borders were reopened.

According to the Ministry of Tourism, a total of 2,924 tourist arrivals were recorded on Saturday. Prior to this, the highest number of daily arrivals was recorded on November 29; which was 2,299 arrivals.

Maldives’ borders were closed for nearly four months on March 27, due to the Covid-19 pandemic. They were reopened on July 15, during the third phase of lockdown easing, given the negative impacts on the country’s economy due to the standstill on the tourism industry.

While there were 1,701 arrivals during the first 15 days after border reopening, August saw 7,628 arrivals. 9,538 tourists visited the island nation in September and 21,515 in October. There were 35,708 arrivals recorded in November. With the 2,924 arrivals on Saturday, there have been 9,705 arrivals thus far in December.

While 382,847 tourist arrivals were recorded prior to border closure, there have been over 85,846 arrivals since.

Russia is the top source market for tourism since border reopening with 18,937 arrivals recorded by December 5, and the country recently took over recently as the leading source market for the year with over 46,000 arrivals.

India remains in second with 11,726 arrivals since border reopening while the third-leading source market is still the United Kingdom with 6,567 arrivals.

Minister Mausoom recently announced that the country will be able to meet its target of 500,000 tourist arrivals by December 25; a total of 468,693 arrivals were recorded by December 5.

Maldives welcomed a record breaking 1.7 million tourist arrivals in 2019, and a two million target was made for 2020. This all changed following the Covid-19 pandemic, which has taken a toll on the country’s tourism industry and in turn economy.