In 2024, the total contribution of travel and tourism to the global gross domestic product (GDP) amounted to **** trillion U.S. dollars. This figure, which includes the direct, indirect, and induced impact of the global travel and tourism market, represented an increase in total contribution to GDP of *** percent over 2019. As forecast, the total contribution of the travel and tourism sector to the global GDP was expected to reach **** trillion U.S. dollars in 2025. Which countries record the highest travel and tourism contribution to GDP? GDP is the total value of all goods and services produced in a country in a year. It is considered an important indicator of a country's economic strength, and a positive change in GDP is a sign of economic growth. Both before and after the impact of COVID-19, the United States and China were by far the leading travel markets based on the total contribution of travel and tourism to GDP, followed by Germany, Japan, and the United Kingdom. What are the most visited countries in the world? In 2023, France was the country with the highest number of international tourist arrivals worldwide, welcoming 100 million international visitors. While the United States reported the third-highest number of inbound tourist arrivals that year, it was the destination with the highest international tourism receipts worldwide, ranking ahead of Spain and the United Kingdom.

Global Tourism Direct GDP by Country, 2023 Discover more data with ReportLinker!

Dataset

This dataset was created by Abshar Mohamed

Released under World Bank Dataset Terms of Use

Contents

The average for 2020 based on 32 countries was 2.47 percent. The highest value was in Croatia: 9.72 percent and the lowest value was in Russia: 0.33 percent. The indicator is available from 1995 to 2020. Below is a chart for all countries where data are available.

The forecast for the direct contribution of travel and tourism to global GDP in 2029 is a little under 5,563 trillion U.S. dollars. In contrast, the total contribution to GDP worldwide is predicted to reach 18,031 billion U.S. dollars in 2029.

Sri Lanka Tourism Contribution: GDP data was reported at 2.500 % in 2023. This records an increase from the previous number of 0.800 % for 2020. Sri Lanka Tourism Contribution: GDP data is updated yearly, averaging 3.400 % from Dec 2018 (Median) to 2023, with 4 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 4.900 % in 2018 and a record low of 0.800 % in 2020. Sri Lanka Tourism Contribution: GDP data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by Sri Lanka Tourism Development Authority. The data is categorized under Global Database’s Sri Lanka – Table LK.Q007: Tourism Receipts.

Dataset Overview 📝

This dataset includes key tourism and economic indicators for over 200 countries, spanning the years from 1999 to 2023. It covers a wide range of data related to tourism arrivals, expenditures, receipts, GDP, unemployment, and inflation, helping to explore the relationship between tourism and economic growth globally.

Tourism & Economic Indicators:

• tourism_receipts 💰: The total income a country generates from international tourism, measured in current US dollars.
• tourism_arrivals 🌍: The total number of international tourists who arrive in a country, measured in count.
• tourism_expenditures 🛍️: The amount of money spent by international tourists within the country, measured in current US dollars.
• tourism_exports 📈: The percentage of a country’s total exports derived from international tourism receipts.
• tourism_departures ✈️: The number of citizens or residents of a country who travel abroad for tourism.
• tourism_expenditures 🛫: The percentage of a country’s total imports spent on international tourism.
• gdp 📊: The total value of all goods and services produced in a country, expressed in current US dollars.
• inflation 📉: The annual percentage change in the average price of goods and services in a country.
• unemployment 👷‍♂️: The percentage of people within the labor force who are unemployed but actively seeking work.

Data Source 🌐

• World Bank: The dataset is sourced from the World Bank’s economic and tourism databases, offering reliable and up-to-date statistics on global tourism and economic indicators.

Potential Use Cases 🔍

• Tourism & Economic Impact Analysis 🌏: Analyzing the contribution of tourism to a country’s GDP, as well as how tourism spending impacts national economies.
• Cross-Country Comparison 📊: Comparing tourism arrivals, expenditures, and receipts relative to GDP and unemployment across countries and regions.
• Predictive Modeling 🤖: Building models to predict the future impact of tourism on economic growth and identify emerging trends.
• Policy Evaluation 🏛️: Helping policymakers assess the role of tourism in economic planning, especially regarding inflation and unemployment.
• Economic Forecasting 📈: Using historical data to forecast how tourism will influence economic conditions, helping in the development of economic policies.

Key Questions You Can Explore 🤔

• How do tourism receipts correlate with GDP growth in different countries? 💵
• What is the relationship between tourism expenditure and inflation rates? 📉
• How do tourism arrivals and departures vary by region and what are the key drivers? 🌍
• What role does tourism play in shaping unemployment rates across countries? 👥
• Which countries have seen the largest increase in tourism receipts over the past two decades? 📊

Important Notes ⚠️

• Missing Data 🚨: Some values may be missing for certain years or countries, especially for specific tourism indicators. Techniques like forward filling, backward filling, or interpolation may help in handling missing values during time series analysis.
• Currency & Inflation Adjustments 💲: When comparing tourism receipts and expenditures across countries, consider adjusting for inflation and exchange rates to ensure accurate year-on-year comparisons.

The United States' travel and tourism industry directly contributed the largest amount to gross domestic profit (GDP) out of any country worldwide with a total contribution of 580.7 billion U.S. dollars in 2019. Comparatively, the ever-growing travel and tourism industry in China directly contributed the second largest sum to GDP. Meanwhile, Europe was home to half of the top 10 countries with the highest direct contribution to GDP globally (through travel and tourism).

What is GDP?

GDP is the total value of all goods and services produced in a country in a year. It is considered an important indicator of the economic strength of a country and a positive change is an indicator of economic growth.

📝 About the Dataset

This dataset provides a comprehensive view of global tourism indicators, covering multiple economic and travel-related variables for countries across several years. It is built to support Exploratory Data Analysis (EDA), predictive modeling, economic research, time-series trend analysis, and machine learning preprocessing.

Each row represents a specific country-year record, containing tourism performance metrics, economic indicators, and travel expenditure information. The dataset is clean, structured, and ideal for producing insights about international tourism patterns and their economic impacts.

🎯 Purpose of the Dataset

This dataset is well-suited for:

• Tourism trend analysis
• Country-wise comparative analysis
• Exploratory Data Analysis (EDA) practice
• Outlier detection and handling
• Feature engineering & preprocessing techniques
• Correlation analysis between tourism and economy
• Visualization projects
• Machine learning model preparation

📂 Columns & Data Dictionary (Based on Your File)

1. country

• Type: String
• Description: Full name of the country.

2. country_code

• Type: String
• Description: 3-letter ISO country code (e.g., IND, USA, AFG).

3. year

• Type: Integer
• Description: The year for which tourism and economic indicators are recorded.

4. tourism_receipts

• Type: Float (USD)
• Description: Total international tourism receipts for the country in that year.
• Represents income generated from foreign visitors.

5. tourism_arrivals

• Type: Float
• Description: Total number of international tourist arrivals.
• Useful for understanding travel demand.

6. tourism_exports

• Type: Float
• Description: Tourism-related exports, including money spent by inbound tourists on goods/services.

7. tourism_departures

• Type: Float
• Description: Number of outbound tourists from the country in the recorded year.

8. tourism_expenditures

• Type: Float
• Description: Outbound tourism expenditures—money spent by citizens traveling abroad.

9. gdp

• Type: Float (USD)
• Description: Gross Domestic Product of the country.
• Helps relate tourism activity to economic performance.

10. inflation

• Type: Float (percentage)
• Description: Inflation rate for the country during that year.

11. unemployment

• Type: Float (percentage)
• Description: Unemployment rate for the country.
• Useful for socio-economic correlation studies.

🔍 Key Insights the Dataset Can Produce

With these variables, you can analyze:

• Trends in global tourism
• Whether GDP affects tourism demand
• Relationship between inflation and travel spending
• Tourism arrivals vs receipts correlation
• Economic growth driven by tourism
• Country-level tourism performance comparison
• Travel behavior based on expenditures & departures

📁 File Format

• CSV format
• Clean column names
• Each row = country + year records

Democratic Republic of the Congo: International tourism revenue, percent of GDP: The latest value from 2018 is 0.13 percent, an increase from 0.02 percent in 2017. In comparison, the world average is 7.64 percent, based on data from 154 countries. Historically, the average for Democratic Republic of the Congo from 2005 to 2018 is 0.04 percent. The minimum value, 0 percent, was reached in 2007 while the maximum of 0.13 percent was recorded in 2009.

The average for 2020 based on 23 countries was 2.13 percent. The highest value was in the Seychelles: 16.49 percent and the lowest value was in Guinea: 0.01 percent. The indicator is available from 1995 to 2020. Below is a chart for all countries where data are available.

The market size of the global tourism sector grew significantly in 2023 over the previous year, totaling around *** trillion U.S. dollars. Despite the sharp annual increase, global tourism revenue remained below pre-pandemic levels. As forecast, the market size of the tourism sector worldwide was estimated at *** trillion U.S. dollars in 2024. What is the economic impact of travel and tourism? In 2023, the total contribution of travel and tourism to global GDP, including the direct, indirect, and induced impact of these markets, was estimated at nearly ** trillion U.S. dollars, almost recovering from the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. Similarly, the number of travel and tourism jobs worldwide was just around *** percent below pre-pandemic levels in 2023, with these industries generating, directly and indirectly, *** million jobs. What are the most popular travel destinations worldwide? Both before and after the COVID-19 pandemic, France topped the ranking of the most visited countries by inbound tourists worldwide. In 2023, the number of inbound tourist arrivals in France peaked at *** million, the highest figure reported to date. That year, Spain, the United States, and Italy followed on the list. Meanwhile, the United States was the country with the highest international tourism receipts worldwide in 2023, ahead of Spain and the United Kingdom.

According to a study by the World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC), Paris was the city with the highest direct travel and tourism contribution to GDP in 2022. That year, the direct travel and tourism GDP in the capital of France - the country with the highest number of international tourist arrivals worldwide - amounted to roughly ***** billion U.S. dollars. Meanwhile, Beijing and Orlando followed on the ranking in 2022, with a direct travel and tourism GDP of around **** billion and **** billion U.S. dollars, respectively.

Series Name: Tourism direct GDP as a proportion of total GDP (percent)Series Code: ST_GDP_ZSRelease Version: 2020.Q2.G.03 This dataset is the part of the Global SDG Indicator Database compiled through the UN System in preparation for the Secretary-General's annual report on Progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals.Indicator 8.9.1: Tourism direct GDP as a proportion of total GDP and in growth rateTarget 8.9: By 2030, devise and implement policies to promote sustainable tourism that creates jobs and promotes local culture and productsGoal 8: Promote sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and productive employment and decent work for allFor more information on the compilation methodology of this dataset, see https://unstats.un.org/sdgs/metadata/

Portugal: International tourism revenue, percent of GDP: The latest value from 2020 is 4.58 percent, a decline from 10.24 percent in 2019. In comparison, the world average is 3.33 percent, based on data from 125 countries. Historically, the average for Portugal from 1995 to 2020 is 6.07 percent. The minimum value, 4.54 percent, was reached in 1996 while the maximum of 10.24 percent was recorded in 2019.

Key information about Malaysia Tourism Revenue Growth

• Malaysia Tourism Revenue grew 43.4 % YoY in Dec 2024, compared with an increase of 155.9 % YoY in the previous year
• Malaysia Tourism Revenue Growth rate data is updated yearly, available from Dec 1982 to Dec 2024
• The data reached an all-time high of 11,572.1 % in Dec 2022 and a record low of -98.1 % in Dec 2021

Tourism accounts for 9% of global GDP and comprises 1.1 billion tourist arrivals per annum. Visits to wildlife tourist attractions (WTAs) may account for 20–40% of global tourism, but no studies have audited the diversity of WTAs and their impacts on the conservation status and welfare of subject animals. We scored these impacts for 24 types of WTA, visited by 3.6–6 million tourists per year, and compared our scores to tourists’ feedback on TripAdvisor. Six WTA types (impacting 1,500–13,000 individual animals) had net positive conservation/welfare impacts, but 14 (120,000–340,000 individuals) had negative conservation impacts and 18 (230,000–550,000 individuals) had negative welfare impacts. Despite these figures only 7.8% of all tourist feedback on these WTAs was negative due to conservation/welfare concerns. We demonstrate that WTAs have substantial negative effects that are unrecognised by the majority of tourists, suggesting an urgent need for tourist education and regulation of WTAs worldwide.

Key information about Bangladesh Tourism Revenue Growth

• Bangladesh Tourism Revenue dropped 44.3 % YoY in Dec 2020, compared with an increase of 9.5 % YoY in the previous year
• Bangladesh Tourism Revenue Growth rate data is updated yearly, available from Dec 2003 to Dec 2020
• The data reached an all-time high of 62.4 % in Dec 2017 and a record low of -44.3 % in Dec 2020

GDP Nowcast: sa: YoY: Contribution: Tourism: No. of Hotel Room: Occupied: Tourist Center data was reported at 1.496 % in 01 Dec 2025. This records a decrease from the previous number of 2.991 % for 24 Nov 2025. GDP Nowcast: sa: YoY: Contribution: Tourism: No. of Hotel Room: Occupied: Tourist Center data is updated weekly, averaging 0.973 % from Jan 2019 (Median) to 01 Dec 2025, with 361 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 3.047 % in 07 Apr 2025 and a record low of 0.000 % in 19 Aug 2024. GDP Nowcast: sa: YoY: Contribution: Tourism: No. of Hotel Room: Occupied: Tourist Center data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by CEIC Data. The data is categorized under Global Database’s Mexico – Table MX.CEIC.NC: CEIC Nowcast: Gross Domestic Product (GDP).

In 2019, travel and tourism direct contribution to GDP for Togo was 0.2 billion US dollars. Travel and tourism direct contribution to GDP of Togo increased from 0 billion US dollars in 2000 to 0.2 billion US dollars in 2019 growing at an average annual rate of 19.91%.