Visitor arrivals in October down 16% y-o-y from pre-pandemic levels

The number of visitor arrivals to Macau continues to recover steadily with last month (October 2023) registering an increase of 19.8% month-to-month when compared with September this year, a release from the Statistics and Census Service notes.

Nonetheless, the total figure of 2,757,308 reached last month fell some 16.41% short of the number registered back in October 2019, with 452,443 fewer people visiting Macau this October.

From the October total, same-day visitors (1,451,703) and overnight visitors (1,305,605) also show significant gains, particularly day visitors, as the average length of stay has dropped significantly when compared to 2022 (-0.6 days year-on-year) to 1.2 days (the same as in 2019).

To clarify, only the visitors who stay in legal hotels or hostel units in Macau are considered overnight visitors. Often the “same-day visitors” numbers include those who are in Macau over 24 hours.

It is not clear if this occurs because these visitors stay overnight with family or friends or if they are lodged in other kinds of accommodation that escape the oversight of authorities. Accommodation in homes for other than non-resident workers, residents or their guests is illegal in Macau.

As for those who stayed overnight in Macau, the average stay was 2.3 days, decreasing by 0.9 days y-o-y when compared to 2022 and down 0.1 days when compared with 2019.

Unsurprisingly, the mainland continues to be the place of origin for the most significant share of visitors to Macau (1,949,510), that is 70.7% of the total. From this group, those traveling under the Individual Visit Scheme made up over half (1,009,269).

Last month also saw an increase in the number of visitors arriving from Hong Kong (592,325) and Taiwan (53,667), with those from HK topping the October 2019 figure (567,777).

In the first ten months of this year (Jan to Oct) the number of visitor arrivals has reached 22,685,476, with a slightly higher share of overnight visitors (11,542,405) than same-day visitors (11,143,071).