International tourism volume in the Community of Madrid 2001-2021

The number of international overnight tourists in the Community of Madrid, Spain amounted to approximately 2.2 million in 2021, after plummeting by 77.5 percent in the previous year. Between 2013 and 2019, the international tourism volume in this Spanish autonomous community – which comprises the Spanish capital – experienced an increase of over 80 percent.

Madrid: a top European city destination

Despite the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, Madrid was among the ten European cities with the highest number of nights spent by tourists in paid accommodation in 2020. And in the previous year, the Spanish capital had even made it to the 6th position. In the years prior to the global health crisis, international tourism had accounted for the largest number of overnight tourists in Madrid, reaching more than 5.7 million travelers in that latter year. However, this trend was flipped as a consequence of the strict lockdowns and travel restrictions imposed by governments worldwide. The total combined number of foreign visitors at hotels and apartment lodgings in the city in 2020 and 2021 was below three million versus the 4.7 million domestic visitors recorded in those same years.

Tourists in Madrid spent more than in other Spanish regions

The average travel spending of international visitors in the Community of Madrid was higher than in the other 16 autonomous communities of Spain in 2021, amounting to 1,429 euros for the entire trip. Looking at the daily expenditure, foreign visitors in this Spanish region needed 239 euros per person on average in 2021, which was around 12 percent less than the per capita daily spend recorded two years earlier.