According to Statistics Estonia, more than two million tourists were served in Estonian accommodation businesses in 2021, an increase of 8% over the previous year but a decrease of 44% when compared with 2019. The year 2021 witnessed an increase in the number of domestic tourists, while the number of foreign tourists fell.
Estonia hosted around 600,000 foreign tourists and 1.6 million domestic tourists in 2021, according to Helga Laurmaa, an analyst at Statistics Estonia. According to the Bureau of Statistics, the number of domestic tourists climbed by 22% in 2020 and by 3% in 2019. There were 17% fewer international tourists in 2019 than in 2020, which was a significant drop from the pre-crisis level. Laurmaa explained, “accommodation establishments have never served so many domestic tourists in a year, but the number of foreign tourists was comparable to 1997.”
Domestic tourists stayed in accommodation establishments for 2.7 million nights, while foreign tourists stayed for 1.3 million nights. In contrast to 2020, the number of nights spent by domestic tourists climbed by 20%, while the number of nights spent by foreign tourists decreased by 9%.
The majority of international visitors came from neighbouring countries, with 144,000 arriving from Finland and 89,000 arriving from Latvia. Germany accounted for 42,000 visitors, while Lithuania and Russia both accounted for 29,000 visitors. Both domestic and international tourists were mostly accommodated in the county of Harju, which was followed by the counties of Pärnu, Tartu, and Ida-Viru. In 2021, the average cost of a visitor night was 34 euros, which is a 6% increase over the previous year’s figure.
In December 2021, Estonian accommodation establishments served 195,000 tourists, of whom 123,00 were from Estonia and 71,000 were from foreign countries. They spent a total of 206,000 and 149,000 nights respectively. Due to the fact that travel was more difficult in December 2020 than in December 2021, the number of local and international tourists increased significantly at the end of last year compared to the previous 2020. For tourists, there were 889 different types of accommodations available. It was possible to fill 33% of the rooms and 25% of the available bed spaces. For a guest night, the average cost was 37 euros, which is seven euros more expensive than it was in December of 2020.
Source: Statistics Estonia
