Fewer trips, but more spend per trip – the latest Tourism domestic trends
StatsSA released the latest results on their domestic tourism survey. Domestic tourism offers a glimpse into how households use their time and money to travel within and explore the country, whether through short day trips or overnight stays at destinations.
2025 Reveal a shift in domestic travel patterns between 2024 and 2025. In 2025, an estimated 29,1 million day trips were undertaken, compared with 33,5 million in 2024, indicating a decrease in the number of day trips. Overnight trips also declined from 26,2 million to 24,5 million. Yet, despite this decrease in travel volumes, domestic tourism expenditure increased by R2,6 million.
Tourism expenditure is one of the inputs used to estimate the contribution of tourism to the economy. In 2025, the total expenditure on domestic trips amounted to approximately R63,2 billion, an increase from R60,6 billion in 2024.
Domestic travel activity followed different patterns throughout 2024 compared with the previous year, with the number of trips declining in most months.
For day trips, only January and February recorded increase in the number of trips. For overnight trips, only Jan, Feb, Apr and Jul showed an increase in total overnight trips.
Limpopo becomes the leading overnight destination – Limpopo moved into first place, followed by KZN and the Western Cape (for domestic tourism). Gauteng kept is place as biggest day-trip destination. Mpumalanga ranked 7th for both day trips and overnight domestic trips, receiving 6,4% and 8,9% of the visitors respectively.
Personal shopping was the main purpose of the day trips and visiting friends and relatives raked second, followed by leisure activities.
For overnight travel, visiting friends and relatives was the leading reason, followed by leisure travel and then attending funerals. Interestingly, the leisure travel rose from 21,6% to 24,2%.
Most travellers are aged 35-44 years.
Financial constraints keep many South Africans at home.
