Domestic overnight tourism performance in 2021

The following data tracks the volume and value of domestic overnight tourism trips by British residents in Great Britain in 2021. It's a first release of main estimates of overnight trips in Scotland alongside Great Britain.

We sourced this update from the Great Britain Tourism Survey, tracking the period from the start of April to the end of December 2021. Data is not available for January – March 2021, due to coronavirus COVID-19 restrictions on travel during this period.

Please note that we based the estimates and statistics in this release on a new combined online survey. This replaces the separate Great Britain Tourism Survey and Great Britain Day Visits Surveys that ran until the end of 2019.

As such there is very limited comparability between historic results and the results published from 2021. These statistics have an experimental status and may be subject to change.

We'll provide further information on the methods and quality documentation.

• Check out our current methodology
• Check out our published estimates for 2019

GB residents made a total of 13.6 million overnight trips in Scotland (April to December), staying for 47.1 million nights and spending £2,991 million. We based these estimates on a sample of 1,228 trips.

The average domestic overnight visitor in Scotland in 2021 spent a total of £220 over 3.5 nights with a daily expenditure of £64.

July saw the greatest volume of trips taken. This was in line with:

• The easing of many coronavirus (COVID-19) travel related restrictions
• The traditional holiday period, and schools being off

Holiday trips made up the largest proportion of overnight trips taken in Scotland. They accounted for two in five trips between April and December 2021.

The second largest were trips to visit friends and relatives, which made up one third of all trips.

Business trips, "other" types of trips and overnight stays as part of an overseas trip all made up much smaller proportions of the total. A similar pattern was also seen for both nights and spend.

Visitors on business trips stayed the longest in Scotland on average. The second longest were those visiting friends or relatives, and holidaymakers.

Holidaymakers spent the most on average during their entire trip. The following biggest spenders were visitors in the "other" types of trip category and those visiting for business.

In terms of the average spend per night, visitors within the "other" types of trip category were the highest spenders.

Just over a third of overnight trips were to the cities and large towns of Scotland. One quarter went to the countryside / villages and another quarter to small town locations. An additional 11% of overnight trips to Scotland took place in seaside or coastal locations.

There was an even spread of trips to the North, East and West of Scotland, with the three regions accounting for just under a third of overnight trips each. The South of Scotland was the main destination visited for the remaining 7% of overnight trips.

Nearly half of all overnight trips to Scotland stayed in serviced accommodation. One fifth choosing to stay in someone’s private home, which includes the home of friends or relatives as well as second homes. Around one in ten trips preferred self-catering property rentals. Another one in ten chose caravan / camping / glamping.

The majority of trips in April to December 2021 were single-destination trips, with just one third visiting two or more places. This reflects the proportion of holiday trips (40%), which are more likely to be multi-destination. Compare this to visiting friends and relatives and business trips, which are more likely to be to one destination.

Residents of Scotland generated the highest volume of trips and spend to Scotland accounting for nearly one in two trips taken. The regions of England generating the largest proportion of trips to Scotland were:

• London
• Yorkshire and the Humber
• The North West of England

The survey spread trips to Scotland across different age groups. Those in age ranges 16-34 followed by 35-54 generated the highest number of trips in Scotland.

Scotland visitors had an average party size of 2.76 people. 27% of visitors to Scotland were solo travellers with 46% being in a 2-person party. 32% of Scotland visitors had children in their travel party (44% in the household).

A mix of life stages (see section on definitions) took trips in Scotland in 2021. Families accounted for 43% of overnight trips in Scotland, 41% of nights and 32% of spend. Although Empty nesters took 19% of trips, they contributed 28% of nights and 27% of spend.