Maintaining its position as one of the world’s leading tourism destinations, Jamaica reports that it welcomed a total of more than 1.5 million visitor arrivals to its shores in 2021. These visitors’ on-island spend totalled over USD $2.095 billion into the country’s economy, positively impacting local businesses and tourism stakeholders.

Visitor arrivals and spend for full year 2021 had originally been projected to be approximately 1.5 million and USD $1.9 billion, respectively. Of the total 1,535,165 visitor arrivals recorded, 1,464,399 were air stopover arrivals. The U.S. was both the largest and best-performing market, accounting for 1,278,679 air stopover arrivals in 2021. Overall, visitors have been staying longer in 2021, with the average length of stay increasing to 9.1 nights in 2021 as compared to 7.9 nights in 2019.

“The fact that we exceeded visitor arrivals and spend projections for 2021 is a clear testament to the strength and resilience of Jamaica’s tourism product as well as the excellent relationships we enjoy with our travel industry partners,” said the Hon. Edmund Bartlett, Minister of Tourism, Jamaica. “As we are gradually relaxing travel restrictions, we fully expect a stronger recovery as consumers from our key source markets are resuming international travel in steadily growing numbers.”

For the month of December 2021 alone, air stopover arrivals reached 223,333 or 79.4% of December 2019 levels. Tourism and infrastructure developments across the island continue to move forward and the destination retains a positive outlook for the tourism sector in 2022, the year of Jamaica’s 60th Anniversary of Independence. For 2022, Jamaica is projecting approximately 2.45 to 2.5 million visitor arrivals with a total visitor spend of about USD $2.9 billion.

This past weekend, March 3-6, 2022, Jamaica welcomed approximately 27,000 visitors to island including some 8,700 visitors on Saturday alone, the highest number for any one given day since the reopening of its borders in June 2020. Current bookings indicate a very strong month for March 2022, with projections for it to be on par with March 2019.

Jamaica continues to welcome visitors safely through its highly acclaimed Jamaica CARES program, which prioritizes health and safety of every Jamaican and every visitor to the country. The program was among the first to receive the World Travel & Tourism Council’s Safe Travels recognition and allowed the island to safely reopen.

For more information on Jamaica, please go to visitjamaica.com.