Singapore recorded 1.63 million visitor arrivals in January, a monthly tally up 17.3 percent sequentially and a gain of 14.8 percent year-on-year, according to an update from the Singapore Tourism Board (STB).
Around 73 percent of the 1.63 million visitor arrivals – i.e., 1.19 million – were overnight visitors, according to STB’s latest statistics. The January overnight-visitor cohort grew by 10.3 percent year-on-year, and was also up 24.0 percent from December’s 959,700.
The top three source markets for Singapore’s inbound visits in January, were, respectively: China (376,470), Indonesia (251,770) and Australia (141,340).
Among those segments, Chinese visitors had the longest average stay length, at 3.66 days. Across all international source markets, the average was 3.52 days.
The city-state’s tourism board forecast earlier this month, that 2025 international visitor arrivals would be in the range of 17.0 million to 18.5 million. At the lower end of the range, that would be a 2.8-percent improvement on 2024’s 16.53-million visitor arrivals, and at the upper end of the 2025 forecast, it would be a year-on-year gain of 11.9 percent.
Singapore’s 2024 visitor arrival tally was 86.5 percent of 2019 level, the year preceding the Covid-19 pandemic, when the country logged 19.12 million visitors.
In its February 4 forecast for 2025, the STB also mentioned the city-state’s visitors might this year generate approximately SGD29.0 billion (US$21.6 billion) to SGD30.5 billion in tourism receipts.
The authority had also noted that for 2024, tourism receipts were likely to have beaten 2019’s record of SGD27.7 billion. The official figures are likely to be released in the second quarter of this year.
Singapore has a casino duopoly consisting of Resorts World Sentosa, run by Genting Singapore Ltd, and Marina Bay Sands Ltd, run by a unit of Las Vegas Sands Corp.
