Tourist arrivals exceed 300,000 in May

The Cyprus Statistical Service (Cystat) on Friday released its latest tourism report showing that 315,018 tourists arrived in Cyprus in May 2022, a 212.3 per cent year-on-year increase.

The number of arrivals stood at 100,852 visitors in May of the previous year.

For the period between January and May 2022, tourist arrivals amounted to 849,058 visitors, compared to just 156,825 in the corresponding period of 2021.

The same figure stood at 246,556 between January and May in 2020, while a record 1,121,361 tourists visited Cyprus during the corresponding period of time in 2019.

Arrivals from the United Kingdom were the main source of tourism for May 2022, with a share of 40.1 per cent (126,324) of total arrivals.

This was followed by Poland with 7.4 per cent (23,197 visitors), Israel with 6.9 per cent (21,749), Germany with 6.5 per cent (20,592), Sweden with 5.1 per cent (15,943) and Greece with 4.4 per cent (13,905).

79.5 per cent of tourist arrivals said that the purpose of their trip in May 2022 was holidays, while 12.5 per cent came to Cyprus to visit friends and relatives.

Moreover, 7.9 per cent of arrivals said that they came to the island for business purposes.

Respectively, in May 2021, 80.7 per cent of tourists visited Cyprus for holidays, 9.8 per cent visited friends or relatives and 9.4 per cent visited Cyprus for business purposes.