Top European tourism cities by bed nights 2023

In 2023, London was the leading European city tourism destination based on the number of bed nights. That year, bed nights in the United Kingdom's capital exceeded 78 million, denoting a sharp annual increase but not fully recovering yet from the impact of COVID-19. Meanwhile, Paris and Istanbul followed in the ranking in 2023, with roughly 52 million and nearly 30 million bed nights.

What are the most visited countries in Europe?

While the French capital came in second among leading European cities based on bed nights, France topped the ranking of the European countries with the highest number of inbound tourist arrivals in 2023, ahead of Spain, Italy, and Turkey. Meanwhile, when looking at European countries with the highest tourism receipts that year, Spain recorded the highest figure, with over 90 billion U.S. dollars, followed by the United Kingdom.

How many international tourists visit Europe every year?

In 2023, the number of international tourist arrivals in Europe grew significantly over the previous year, totaling over 700 million. This figure, however, remained below pre-pandemic levels. Overall, either before and after the impact of COVID-19, Europe was the region with the highest number of international tourist arrivals worldwide.

Leading city tourism destinations in Europe from 2019 to 2023, by number of bed nights (in millions)

Characteristic	2019	2020	2021	2022	2023
London¹	85.1	20.77	25.54	59.13	78.1
Paris¹	52.45	14.13	20.47	50.13	52.4
Istanbul	23.93	9.89	18.57	29.63	29.75
Berlin	34.12	12.28	13.98	26.53	29.58
Rome¹	29.07	5.35	5.03	20.32	29.51
Amsterdam¹	18.38	5.8	5.78	18.25	23.9
Barcelona¹	19.85	3.92	6.1	19.73	21.71
Madrid¹	20.68	5.05	10.93	17.66	19.97
Munich¹	18.29	7.03	7.95	16.02	18.63
Vienna¹	18.64	4.93	5.41	13.9	18.16
Prague	18.48	4.9	5.26	13.22	16.86
Hamburg	15.43	6.88	7.5	14.71	15.94
Lisbon	13.82	-	5.19	13.32	15.14
Stockholm¹	15.3	6.9	9.23	14.34	15.11
Copenhagen	9.61	-	-	10.38	11.65

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Release date

July 2024

More information

Region

Europe

Survey time period

2019 to 2023

Special properties

figures include domestic and international bed nights in all paid forms of accommodation establishments

Supplementary notes

¹ According to the source, these cities have different definitions and data rectifications.

Cities are ranked based on the number of bed nights recorded in 2023. Figures have been rounded.

Blanks indicate unavailable data. Figures prior to 2023 were previously published by the source. 2019 and 2022 data for Copenhagen were calculated by Statista based on the percentage changes provided by the source.

The ranking is from City Destinations Alliance's CityDNA Benchmarking Report based on total bed nights from the following markets: United States, Germany, United Kingdom, France, Italy, Spain, Russia, China, and Japan.

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