Greeks are traveling abroad more, spending more, while it seems that they are turning more towards destinations in Central and Northern Europe compared to popular neighboring destinations in Turkey or Bulgaria.

It is indicative that, based on official data, departures from Greece increased in 2024 by 8%, from 6.2 million in 2023 to 6.7 million in 2024, while expenditures had a double-digit increase, at +15%, from €2.4 billion in 2023 to €2.8 billion in 2024. In fact, this is the highest number historically, given that the relevant Border Survey of the Bank of Greece has been recording values since 2005 — and this despite the marginal decrease in overnight stays (-1%) to 34.5 million in 2024. The Average Per Capita Expenditure (APCE) amounted to €420 in 2024, up +7% from €393 in 2023, due to the proportionally higher increase recorded in the Average Expenditure per Overnight Stay (AEOS) by 17%, from €70 in 2023 to €81 in 2024. Greeks, however, still spend less abroad compared to what foreigners spend in Greece, with the APCE ratio standing, indicatively, at 27%.

The data come from the latest study of INSETE titled “Outbound Travel Movement from Greece, 2023–2024”, according to which the improvement of the economic climate in Greece positively influenced the desire of Greece’s residents for travel abroad.

The 3 Reasons

Given that departures and overnight stays are still below pre-pandemic levels, the faster recovery of payments abroad can be attributed to the following main reasons:

– To inflationary pressures that drove the tourist package to higher price levels.

– To the change in the travel preferences of Greece’s residents from neighboring, low-spending tourist destinations, i.e., Turkey and Bulgaria (from 26% in 2023 to 22% in 2024) to traditional, high-spending tourist destinations, such as Germany, France, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom (from 27% in 2023 to 28% in 2024), which have comparatively significantly higher spending.

– Combined also with the shorter duration of stay at destinations (-9%, from 5.6 overnight stays in 2023 to 5.2 overnight stays in 2024), to the change in tourist preferences, with a decrease in the share of holidays with friends and relatives, which have a long duration of stay, and an increase in the share of vacation holidays, which have higher tourist expenditure, and city tourism, which has a shorter duration of stay.

It should be mentioned here that the seasonality of outbound tourism is not concentrated, as in inbound tourism, in the 2nd and 3rd quarters of each year (78% of arrivals and 81.5% of receipts for 2024), but is distributed almost evenly across the four quarters of the year, with perhaps the exception of the 1st quarter, which lags behind compared to the other quarters. Nevertheless, in 2024, the increase in the share of the 1st quarter in departures (from 20% in 2023 to 22% of the total in 2024) and in payments (from 18% in 2023 to 20% in 2024) was noteworthy.

Preferred Destinations

Trips to Eurozone countries, compared to those to other countries, recorded high positive percentage changes in all figures (departures +15%, overnight stays +5%, payments +19%), which either pulled the overall figures upwards (departures +8% and payments +15%) or almost offset the losses (overnight stays -1%) of the other destinations.

Furthermore, based on departures, in 2024 a small increase is observed in the shares of traditional, high-spending destinations such as Germany, the United Kingdom, Italy, France, and the Netherlands, from 27% in 2023 to 28% in 2024, and a decrease in the neighboring, low-spending destinations of Bulgaria and Turkey, from 26% in 2023 to 22% in 2024.