British visitors to Spain spent 12% more last year than pre-pandemic, but the average trip was 5% shorter.

In a media update today, the UK Director of the Spanish Tourist Office Manuel Butler said that while Spain saw a 2% increase in visitor numbers last year, the number of British visitors fell by 3.8% compared to 2019.

Nevertheless, Brits accounted for €19,946m of the €108 billion tourists spent in Spain last year, with an average daily spend of €136, up 23% over 2019. Manuel said he was unsure at this stage if this was due to an increase in prices or tourists upgrading their accommodation.

The average length of a British holiday was down from 7.29 days in 2019 to 6.91 days, which compared to an overall average length of stay of 7.3 days, which was an increase of 2.5% compared to pre-pandemic.

Manuel said summer was becoming ‘less and less’ important, accounting for 44% of arrivals last year compared with 45% pre-pandemic. He said this had been a trend since 2017.

He said northern Spain was becoming more popular, with the region seeing a 23% increase in visitors last year.

In future, the tourist board will focus on attracting higher spending older travellers, specifically targeting the over 55s and pushing gastronomic and cultural holidays and city breaks and MICE, he added. Some 42% of new hotels that opened in Spain last year are four- and five-star.

While Manuel and his deputy Pedro Medina have been pushing this message to the UK trade since they arrived in the UK since 2019, he said they would start to promote this via the mainstream media.