Inbound tourism volume in St. Kitts & Nevis 2010-2023

In 2023, St. Kitts and Nevis welcomed over 888 thousand international visitors. This figure represented an increase of about 57 percent compared to the previous year.  

Tourism impact on Saint Kitts and Nevis’ economy

The Federation of Saint Christopher and Nevis, as it is officially known, is a two-island country located in the Caribbean. Like its neighbor countries and territories, tourism plays a key role in the nation’s economy. This relation can be seen by the fact that the travel and tourism sector directly represented an important share of St. Kitts and Nevis’ GDP over the years, which is forecast to reach nearly 1.5 billion U.S. international dollars in 2027. Following in this familiar tone, the visitor’s expenditure exhibited a mostly positive development throughout the 2010s, peaking in 2018 at 530 million East Caribbean dollars before declining slightly in 2019 and plunging in the following two years due to the impact of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. By 2023, the spending of international tourists in the St. Kitts and Nevis had grown back to over 428 million East Caribbean dollars.

Cruise tourism in Saint Kitts and Nevis

Although not atop the ranking of the top cruise tourist spots in the Caribbean, St. Kitts and Nevis ranks among the top ten Central American and Caribbean destinations for this type of travelers. In fact, cruise tourism contributes to a great portion of Saint Kitts and Nevis’ tourism sector. Between 2013 and 2018, the Caribbean country had seen a steady increase in the number of cruise passengers, reaching nearly 1.17 million in 2018 before experiencing a considerable decline to only 102 thousand in 2021. Nonetheless, cruise tourism in St. Kitts and Nevis has been recovering post-pandemic, with over 774,000 cruise passengers arriving on the islands in 2023.