Singapore’s visitor arrivals dip in August as travel demand cools due to seasonal factors

SINGAPORE’S international visitor arrivals slipped to 1.31 million in August, as inbound travel tapered off due to seasonal tourism demand.

August’s reading was slightly down from the 1.42 million recorded in July, based on Singapore Tourism Board’s latest data released on Wednesday (Sep 20). It is also slightly less than double the 728,744 visitors recorded in August 2022.

“The fall in visitor arrivals was due to seasonality, with inbound travel falling off after the mid-year school holidays,” said Wong Xian Yang, head of research for Singapore and South-east Asia at Cushman & Wakefield.

He noted that these travel patterns were consistent even before the Covid-19 pandemic, where visitor arrivals tend to peak in July for the year.

Aside from August being a traditionally slower month for travel, the dip in inbound travellers could also be due to the weakening global outlook and loss in consumer confidence in some of Singapore’s key source markets, said Govinda Singh, executive director of hotels and leisure for Asia at Colliers International.

“Sticky high airfares and accommodation costs have also started to weigh on consumer sentiment as inflation persists,” added Singh.

Analysts, however, were mixed on whether visitor arrivals will creep back up, or continue to dip, in the next month.

With big international events such as the Singapore Formula 1 (F1) Grand Prix on the calendar in September, the month could see international arrival numbers climbing back to the levels seen in July, which was the strongest month of 2023 so far, said Singh.

In contrast, Wong noted that historical data between 2017 and 2019 showed that September tends to be an off-peak travel period, with arrivals falling month on month despite the F1 night race.

“This trend is expected to play out this year,” he said. “Nonetheless, the fall in visitors could be partially mitigated as outbound travel from China continues to recover, coupled with a long holiday in China which starts from Sep 29.”

In August, China retained its spot as the top source of visitors to Singapore, with 214,491 tourists visiting the country. This was slightly less than the 231,328 Chinese tourists in the previous month.

Wong expects China to remain the top market for inbound travel for Singapore, as outbound travel from the former continues to steadily recover.

Indonesia was the next-largest source country, from which 167,853 visitors hailed in August. This was down from 229,886 travellers in July.

Malaysia climbed to clinch third position in August, with 87,895 tourists, up from 84,876 in the preceding month.

India and Australia took the fourth and fifth spots, with 83,556 and 80,377 visitors, respectively. This was fewer than the 93,054 travellers from India and 98,406 from Australia the previous month.