At 137 million, overnight stays still remained 10.3 % below 2019
Vienna – In 2022, 136.93 million overnight stays and 39.79 million arrivals were reported in Austrian accommodation establishments, according to preliminary results by Statistics Austria.
“After two difficult years for tourism, overnight stays in Austrian accommodation establishments in 2022 were only 10.3 % or 15.8 million overnight stays below the all-time high of the pre-crisis year 2019. The year 2022 reached almost 137 million overnight stays and thus ranked among the top five years with the highest number of overnight stays – although in the first quarter of 2022, there were still corona-related restrictions on travel, guests from more distant markets of origin continued to stay away and city tourism recovered only slowly,” says Tobias Thomas, Director General of Statistics Austria.
The calendar year 2022: almost three-quarters more overnight stays than in 2021
Compared to the previous year, overnight stays rose by 57.4 million (+72.2 %) in 2022 due to gains in overnight stays from both residents (+31.4 % to 38.89 million) and non-resident guests (+96.3 % to 98.05 million). Arrivals (39.80 million) also recorded an increase in the calendar year 2022 compared to the previous year (+79.8 %).
With 53.43 million overnight stays by guests from Germany, 21.34 million (+66.5 %) more stays were registered than in 2021. The second most important foreign market of origin, the Netherlands, closed in the year 2022 with 9.99 million overnight stays (+130.4 %).
The yearly result of 2022 has not yet reached pre-crisis level of the record-breaking year 2019
With almost 137 million overnight stays, the past calendar year ranks fifth behind 2016 (140.88 million), 2017 (144.50 million), 2018 (149.82 million), and 2019 (152.71 million). Thus, overnight stays in 2022 were still 10.3 % or 15.8 million overnight stays below the mark of the record year 2019. According to the analysis of the available overnight stay figures, this is mainly due to three factors: the corona-related restrictions that still prevailed in the first quarter of 2022, the absence of guests from more distant markets of origin, and the slower recovery of Viennese tourism compared to the rest of Austria.
Third quarter of 2022 already reached the pre-crisis level
In the first quarter of 2022, overnight stays were still 25.5 % below the level of 2019. In the following two quarters, the pre-crisis level was only slightly undercut, with -5.5 % and -0.1 % respectively. In the fourth quarter of 2022, almost 2 million or 7.4 % fewer overnight stays were achieved compared to 2019. The adjustment to the pre-crisis level in the months of April-September could therefore not be fully continued in the last three months of the past calendar year.
Resident guests are only just below 2019, and non-European markets still significantly below
By country of origin, the number of resident guests in the calendar year 2022 was comparatively slightly below the level of 2019 by 2.7 %, while non-resident guest nights declined by 13.0 %. The important foreign source markets of Germany and the Netherlands, which together with Austria accounted for around three-quarters of all overnight stays in 2022, were down 5.7 % and 3.6 % respectively in 2019. However, there was a sharp decline in the number of overnight stays from Asian source countries (including China, Japan, and arab countries in Asia), where only a quarter of the 2019 number of overnight stays were registered in 2022. Guests from America also stayed in Austria around 25 % less frequently than in 2019. Due to the Ukraine war, the decline in overnight stays by Russian guests was 87.9 %, whereas 1.2 million overnight stays were registered in 2019.
15.69 million overnight stays in the first third of the winter season 2022/23; +77.3 % in December 2022
Overall, the number of overnight stays in the first third of the current winter season 2022/23 recorded an increase of 67.6 % with 15.69 million overnight stays. Non-residents guests achieved an increase of 72.3 % with a total of 11.27 million overnight stays and resident guests reached 4.41 million overnight stays (+56.7 %).
With 10.80 million overnight stays, the month of December 2022 achieved an increase of 77.3 % compared to the same month of the previous year. Both resident guests (2.37 million) and non-resident guests (8.44 million) achieved an increase of 74.1 % and 78.2 %, respectively. With a large increase of 131.1 %, arrivals amounted to 3.38 million.
