Tourism Analysis: Guests Return, but Inflation Dampens Real Revenues

Despite persistent inflation and overall volatile conditions, demand in Austria's accommodation establishments was stronger in the first half of summer 2023 than before the crisis (arrivals +1.0 percent, overnight stays +2.0 percent). Not only domestic travellers spent more nights between May and July compared to the same period of 2019 (+3.2 percent), but also international guests (+1.5 percent). For the season as a whole, a new high of 79.8 million overnight stays is expected (May to October 2019-2023 +1.1 percent). The calendar year 2023 could see the second-best result after 2019 (–1.7 percent), with an estimated 150 million overnight stays. However, tourism revenues are likely to decline noticeably in real terms due to high inflation and the increasing thriftiness of guests, thus developing less dynamically than the demand for overnight stays.