Vietnam tourism record: 25.4% increase in foreign arrivals

The 11-month record figure has already surpassed the entire year’s target of 8.5 million, the GSO said.

In November alone, more than 926,000 foreigners arrived in Vietnam, 14% higher than last month and 25% higher than last November.

The number of foreign visitors who flew into the country reached 7.53 million, up 32% year-on-year. The number of visitors arriving by sea dropped 11.4% year-on-year to 139,000, while arrivals by road also saw a slight decline of 1.5%, to 1.31 million.

In the 11-month period, the highest number of visitors was from China, with nearly 2.5 million Chinese travelling to Vietnam so far this year, a 54% surge compared to the same period last year.

The Republic of Korea came second, with 1.4 million tourists, up 39.2%, while Japan and the US ranked third and fourth, with 680,000, up 10.5%, and 500,000, up 13.4%, respectively.

The number of tourists also grew from countries such as New Zealand (up 35%), Russia (up 29%), Thailand (up 29%), Italy (up 27%), the UK (up 20%), Germany (up 18%), Canada (up 16%) and Taiwan (up 15%).

The tourism sector also served 57.7 million domestic travellers during this 11-month period, the GSO said. 

The total tourism revenue for the period is estimated at VND368.6 trillion (US$16.4 billion), up 18.6% year-on-year.

With such positive figures, the GSO has forecast that the total number of foreign tourists would likely hit 9.7 million by year end and tourism revenue would touch VND400 trillion (US$17.8 billion).