Croatian tourism enters the main summer season of the tourist year with positive trends and results of tourist traffic. This is shown by the data from eVisitor system, according to which over 7.2 million arrivals and 28.1 million overnights were realized in Croatia from January to the end of June. This represents a growth of 7 percent in arrivals and 3 percent in overnights compared to the same period last year. 25.8 million overnights were realized on the Adriatic coast, which is 2 percent more than last year, while over 1.1 million overnights were realized on the continent part, which represents a growth of 7 percent. During the first six months in the city of Zagreb, 1, 2 million overnights were realized, which represents a growth of 8 percent compared to the same period last year.
"The positive results we achieved in the first part of the year are yet another confirmation that Croatia is profiled as a year-round tourist destination, which offers guests more and more content outside of the summer months. Excellent physical indicators are accompanied by financial ones. In the first quarter we had 24.61 percent more income from foreign tourists compared to the record breaking 2023, and in the first six months a 6.5 percent higher number of fiscalized receipts. With the new investment cycle, for which the Government provided record funds from European funds and the state budget, we will further raise the quality of our offer. We believe that in the coming years Croatia will record even better results in this period, i.e. before and after the summer season, and thus fully achieve our strategic goal of developing tourism throughout the year and in all parts of Croatia. I thank the entire tourism sector for what has been achieved so far, the most intense months of the year are now ahead of us and I believe that we will continue this positive trend“ - emphasized Tonči Glavina, Minister of Tourism and Sports.
When we segment Croatia's tourism results by destinations, in the first half of the year the most overnights were achieved in Istria (8.4 million overnights), Split-Dalmatia County (5 million overnights) and Kvarner (4.4 million overnights), and in terms of destinations - Dubrovnik, Rovinj, Zagreb, Split, Poreč, Umag and Zadar.
"To put it in sports jargon, the Croatian tourism sector did an excellent first half, and we enter the continuation of the tourist year with great optimism. The very intense summer months are ahead of us, and currently over 700 thousand tourists are staying in our country on a daily basis. Soon, this figure will exceed one million guests per day, and this is confirmed by the very high level of accommodation capacity occupancy. On this occasion, I invite all tourism workers to continue their dedicated and high-quality work, because this is the only way we will leave positive impressions on our guests, which is especially important if we know that only satisfied guests return to the destination", said Kristjan Staničić, director of the Croatian National Tourist Board.
Looking at the numbers by different markets, during the first six months the most overnights were made by guests from the German market (5.7 million overnights) and domestic guests (3.7 million overnights), followed by the markets of Slovenia (2.7 million overnights), Austria (2 .6 million overnights), Poland (1.8 million overnights) and the UK (1.3 million overnights). When we look at overnights by type of accommodation facility, the most overnights were in hotels (9.2 million overnights), homestays (over 8 million overnights) and in camps (5.5 million overnights).