More than 15,000 tourist arrivals have been recorded in the first few days of July.

This was revealed by the Ministry of Tourism through its latest weekly tourist arrival statistics publicized on Thursday.

In the first three days of July, Maldives welcomed 15,007 tourists at Velena International Airport (VIA).

The arrivals for the seventh month of the year, are a 5.1 percent growth in comparison to the 14,272 arrivals recorded in the same period last year.

Further, it is higher than the 12,619 arrivals recorded in the same period of 2022.

About 5,002 tourists arrived on average every day during the ongoing month, and tourists are staying for eight days.

The ministry’s statistics go on to reveal that Maldives has welcomed a total of 1,030,536 visitors since between January 1 – July 3.

Arrivals so far this year, are a 9.2 percent increase from the 943,879 arrivals recorded in the same period last year, and a significant growth from the 825,838 arrivals recorded in 2022.

The daily average for 2024 so far, is 5,662 and tourists are staying for an average of eight days.

The highest number of tourist arrivals recorded on a daily basis so far this year, was on February 10, when more than 10,000 tourist arrivals were recorded.

In addition to this, the tourism ministry revealed that China sits at the top of the list of tourist source markets, contributing 12 percent of the market share with 123,852 arrivals by July 3.

The new year began with Italy topping the tourist arrival markets of the island nation, however it was replaced by Russia for a few weeks.

Although the United Kingdom ranked second place for a while, it was replaced by Russia once more.

Russia now contributes 10.4 percent of the market share with 107,023 arrivals recorded so far.

Russia dominated the tourist arrival markets of the Maldives by the end of 2023.

UK currently ranks third place in the top 10 markets, contributing 9.1 percent of the market share with 94,289 arrivals.

Although India was among the top three source markets into the beginning of the year, it was replaced by China.

Welcoming the first tourist of 2024 to the Maldives back in January, Minister of Tourism Ibrahim Faisal noted that it was a fantastic start to what promises to be another successful year for the Maldives’ tourism industry. He expressed keen interest in diversifying and exploring additional markets to reach this year’s arrival target.

Maldives welcomed the one millionth tourist of the year, six months in, on June 27.

The Maldives Marketing and Public Relations Corporation (MMPRC) hosted a ceremony at VIA to welcome Sutapa Amornvivat, a national from Thailand as the one millionth tourist of the year.

The ceremony was held in collaboration with the tourism ministry, Maldives Airports Company Limited (MACL), Maldives Immigration and Maldives Customs Service and multiple other industry stakeholders.

The millionth tourist of the year arrived by an AirAsia Flight on vacation with her family. She was offered a special holiday from Sun Siyam Resorts, at the ceremony.

This was her third trip to the island nation and she stayed at Niyama Maldives.

Maldives welcomed 1.8 million tourists in 2023 and aspires to welcome two million tourists this year.

Tourism was introduced in the Maldives in 1972. It has been 52 years since zealous travelers have been visiting the Maldives which has been drawing in visitors with its picturesque beauty for years.