Resident travel in Portugal drops 1.5% in Q2

Despite the decline, trips abroad increased by 10%, mitigating the overall reduction in travel.

Generic image.
AI

Generic image.

Residents in Portugal made 5.9 million tourist trips in the second quarter of 2026, a decrease of 1.5% compared to the same period last year.

This decrease interrupted the growth trajectory observed since the 3rd quarter of 2024 and resulted from a decline in domestic travel (-3.8%), which totaled 4.8 million, accounting for 81.8% of the total. Conversely, international travel increased by 10.0%, reaching 1.1 million trips (18.2% of the total) and mitigating the overall reduction in travel.
The main motivations for travel were "leisure, recreation, or holidays," responsible for 2.9 million trips (49.9% of the total), and "visiting family or friends," which motivated about 2.1 million resident trips (36.2%).
"Free private accommodation" remained the primary lodging option, accounting for 53.0% of overnight stays (10.1 million). This was followed by "hotels and similar" with 6.4 million overnight stays (34.0% of the total).
In the travel planning process, the internet was used in 32.3% of trips, a resource more frequently used for international travel (69.9%) than for domestic travel (23.9%).
Based on information from the official source: INE - Instituto Nacional de Estatística (28/10/2026)