According to the National Institute of Statistics (INE), data on Portuguese tourist demand for the third quarter of 2022 showed that there was a 5.9% increase in trips, with July being the month with the highest travel. The main reason for traveling was, once again, “leisure, recreation or vacation”.

In the third quarter of 2022, residents of Portugal made 8.2 million trips, which translates into an increase of 5.9% compared to the same period in 2021. However, despite the increase, the figures remain below those recorded in 2019, before the Covid-19 pandemic.

According to the report, the number of trips increased in every month of the third quarter of 2022. In July there was an increase of 10.6%, in August 4.7% and, in September, an increase of 1. 9%.

Most trips were made within national territory: 7.2 million (which corresponds to 88.4%). The value decreased by 0.6% when compared to the same period in 2019. During the analysed period, there was also an increase in Portuguese trips abroad. The growth was 109%, the highest value since the beginning of the pandemic and which corresponds to around 950,000 trips.

The main reason why the Portuguese wanted to travel was “leisure, recreation or holidays”, which has been a trend. There were 5.5 million trips registered with this justification. This was followed by “visiting family or friends” (2.2 million) and “professional or business” reasons (337.1 thousand).

Free stays

The number of overnight stays in “hotels and similar” was higher than the levels recorded in 2019 by 3.7 percentage points, concentrating 31% of overnight stays resulting from residents’ travel.

“Free private accommodation” was, once again, the main accommodation option (corresponding to 54.5% of the total). However, there was a decrease in its weight in the total compared to the impact it had in the third quarter of 2021 and also in the same period of 2019.