According to ONS statistics released 24 May 2019:
- Overseas residents made 37.9M visits to the UK in 2018, 3% fewer than in 2017 - the first drop in visitation since 2010.
- Overseas residents spent 22.9B GBP on visits to the UK in 2018, down 7% from 2017.
- Average length of visit in 2018 was 7.0 nights, down from 7.3 nights in 2017 - likely a factor in reduced spend.
- Distribution of reasons for visits to the UK in 2018:
- Holiday 15.1M
- VFR 11.8M
- Business 8.4M
- Other 2.6M
- Country of residence of visitors to the UK in 2018 (top 10):
- USA
- France
- Germany
- Ireland (Republic)
- Spain
- Netherlands
- Poland
- Italy
- Belgium
- Australia
- UK cities visited (top 5)
- London
- Edinburgh
- Manchester
- Birmingham
- Glasgow
Uncertainty related to Brexit likely accounts for a good part of the dropoff in visitation from EU states (and thus for #1 2018 source market being USA).