Latvians were the most common visitors to Estonia in January

Text Mark Taylor
Photo Andrei Chertkov

According to Statistics Estonia, Estonian accommodation establishments served over 158,000 tourists in January. This is 64 per cent higher than January 2021. Latvians were the most common foreign tourists to Estonia in January.

“Over 53,000 foreign tourists and over 104,000 domestic tourists were accommodated in Estonia in January. Compared to January 2021, there were 412% more foreign tourists, but their number was still more than two times lower than before the pandemic. The number of accommodated foreign tourists was comparable to January eighteen years ago. The number of domestic tourists grew by 22% year on year, and it was also 10% higher than in January 2019,” explained Helga Laurmaa, an analyst at Statistics Estonia. 

For Laurmaa, one of the reasons for such a huge rise in the number of foreign tourists was the very low numbers in January 2021 as a result of restrictions. 

The largest number of foreign tourists in January came from Latvia – 11,000. Over 9,000 foreign tourists came from Finland. There were 8,000 tourists from Russia, 2,000 tourists from Lithuania and 2,000 tourists from Germany. This is a change from normal, where the highest number of foreign tourist are usually from Finland. 

There is plenty of room for the tourist industry to grow as we exit the pandemic with a room occupancy rate of just 29 per cent across accommodation establishments in Estonia.

To learn more about this and similar topics
Estonia Finnish Tourists Estonia Foreign Tourists Estonia Helga Laurmaa Latvian Tourists Estonia Statistics Estonia Tourism Estonia Tourism in Estonia