A strong booking trend from Germany for Antalya is having Turkish tourism professionals anticipating that visitors from Europe’s top economy would reach fresh records this year and may even surpass tourists from Russia for the first time.
The Mediterranean tourism resort hosted about 15.7 million tourists throughout 2023, according to official data, topping its earlier all-time high of 15.3 million in 2019.
More than 3.3 million Germans arrived in Antalya throughout 2023, second to around 3.5 million tourists from Russia, which stem mainly from flight restrictions imposed by Western nations over Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine. Britons ranked third with almost 1.32 million arrivals.
Germans managed to unseat Russians in February this year, according to the Culture and Tourism Ministry data. Arrivals from Germany reached 58,228, compared to 48,937 from Russia.
Antalya has long been a popular holiday destination for Russians, many of whom moved to the resort…