The tourist arrival figure is inching closer to a million.

This was revealed by the Ministry of Tourism through its latest daily tourist arrival statistics publicized on Sunday.

The ministry revealed that Maldives has welcomed a total of 981,070 visitors since 2024 began.

Maldives welcomed 1.8 million tourists in 2023 and aspires to welcome two million tourists this year.

During January the country welcomed 192,385 visitors, followed by 217,392 in February, 194,227 during March, 168,366 during April and 119,875 in May.

Between June 1 – 22, 88,825 tourists were welcomed at Velana International Airport (VIA).

Arrivals so far this year, are a 10.2 percent increase from the 890,363 arrivals recorded in the same period last year, and a significant growth from the 784,116 arrivals recorded in 2022.

The daily average for 2024 so far, is 5,638 and tourists are staying for an average of eight days.

The arrivals for the sixth month of the year, are a 9.5 percent surge in comparison to the 81,119 arrivals recorded in the same period last year as well as the 81,782 arrivals recorded in the same period of 2022.

About 4,038 tourists are arriving on average every day during this month, and tourists are staying in the Maldives for seven days.

The highest number of tourist arrivals recorded on a daily basis so far this year, was on February 10, when more than 10,000 tourist arrivals were recorded.

Further, statistics go on to reveal that while the new year began with Italy topping the tourist arrival markets of the island nation it was replaced by Russia for a few weeks and China currently sits at the top of the list, contributing 11.6 percent of the market share with 113,702 arrivals by June 22.

Although the United Kingdom ranked second place for the past few weeks, it was recently replaced by Russia once more. Russia now contributes 10.3 percent of the market share with 100,677 arrivals recorded so far.

Russia dominated the tourist arrival markets of the Maldives by the end of 2023 as well.

UK currently ranks third place in the top 10 markets, contributing 9.3 percent of the market share with 91,032 arrivals.

Although India was among the top three source markets into the beginning of the year, it was replaced by China.

The first tourist visitor of the new year was welcomed during a special ceremony held at VIA in the early hours of January 1.

Welcoming the first tourist of 2024 to the Maldives, Minister of Tourism Ibrahim Faisal noted that this is a fantastic start to what promises to be another successful year for the Maldives’ tourism industry. He expressed keen interest in diversifying and exploring additional markets to reach this year’s arrival target.

Tourism was introduced in the Maldives in 1972. It has been 52 years since zealous travelers have been visiting the Maldives which has been drawing in visitors with its picturesque beauty for years.