Tourism expenditure in the Bahamas as a share of the country's GDP decreased in 2020 over the previous year. The expenses of outbound tourists as a proportion of the Bahamas' GDP decreased by about ** percent during this period. Similarly, the inbound tourist expenditure to GDP ratio decreased by around ** percent in 2020 compared to 2019.

The Bahamas: International tourism revenue, percent of GDP: The latest value from 2020 is 9.72 percent, a decline from 31.26 percent in 2019. In comparison, the world average is 3.33 percent, based on data from 125 countries. Historically, the average for the Bahamas from 1995 to 2020 is 22.95 percent. The minimum value, 9.72 percent, was reached in 2020 while the maximum of 39.55 percent was recorded in 1995.

The Bahamas experienced an increase of around ** percent in the volume of inbound tourism in 2021, according to data published by the UNWTO. In that year, less than *** thousand overnight tourist arrivals and *** million same-day visitor arrivals were registered in the North American archipelago.

Profile of visitors to the Bahamas

Most of the people who visited the Bahamas in 2021 traveled for leisure or personal purposes. Only ** thousand tourist arrivals to this destination were motivated by business or professional reasons. International tourists primarily arrived from other American countries, mostly from the United States, which is partly explained by the proximity of this islands to the state of Florida.

Impact of tourism in the Bahamas

In 2021, there were more than **** visitors per inhabitant in the Bahamas. However, this relation was around ** to one in pre-pandemic years. Due to this great influx of visitors, the Caribbean country’s economy has become highly dependent on tourism. For instance, visitor spending accounted for approximately one-third of the Bahamas GDP, which translated into a major blow during the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic when this share went down to only ** percent. In addition to this, tourism also contributes significantly to the country's employment in the service sector, which makes up nearly ** percent of the total employment.

Travel services (% of service exports) of Bahamas increased by 1.67% from 92.4 % in 2023 to 93.9 % in 2024. Since the 16.65% drop in 2020, travel services (% of service exports) shot up by 22.02% in 2024. Travel covers goods and services acquired from an economy by travelers for their own use during visits of less than one year in that economy for either business or personal purposes. Travel includes local transport (i.e., transport within the economy being visited and provided by a resident of that economy), but excludes international transport (which is included in passenger transport. Travel also excludes goods for resale, which are included in general merchandise.