The Canary Islands have recorded a third consecutive month of falling tourist numbers compared with last year. The closing of the first half of this year confirmed the soft landing that accommodation operators in the archipelago had sensed since January, and which was fully consolidated following the attack launched by the US and Israel against Iran in the final days of February, spreading anxiety across the global economy.
The decline – 117,571 fewer visitors (-1.3%) – recorded between January and June, according to the Tourist Movements at Borders survey (Frontur), has not, however, been reflected in revenue, which remains intact. The Tourist Spending Survey (Egatur) reveals income of €11.853 billion in the first six months of the financial year. How is this possible? Growing demand has allowed hoteliers in the Islands to negotiate higher rates with tour operators. It is this price increase that sustains business turnover despite a setback that, in any case, was already anticipated.
Demand expected to cool
Neither the public nor the private sector considers ever-rising demand to be healthy. The growth cycle had been running since the impact of the pandemic was overcome. Nor can changes in the composition of household spending structures withstand everything. While it is true that the German market has remained solid despite its economy contracting for two consecutive years – unthinkable before the health crisis – it was also known that the prominence gained by leisure over saving could not last forever.
We are talking here about the second-largest source market for the archipelago, which by the halfway point of 2026 is already showing a negative figure (-3.5%), has cost the Islands’ accommodation sector 50,011 customers, and in the month of June alone recorded a double-digit fall (-11.7%).
Fuerteventura and Gran Canaria diverge
Logically, the islands most disadvantaged by the evolution of these numbers should be those most exposed to the behaviour of the German market. And that is what is happening in the case of Fuerteventura (-10% of Germans), whose overall demand has fallen by 4.7% (-66,251 tourists). Gran Canaria, by contrast, has managed to contain the bleeding. It loses only 2.9% of its German customers and compensates with increases in Dutch travellers (14,838), French visitors (12,636) and, above all, British tourists (20,368), being the only island that avoids entering negative territory with arrivals from the UK.
In the first six months of the financial year, the main source market still managed to grow (0.4% and 12,304 more visitors), although by June its exhaustion is already translating into the numbers. Tenerife receives the biggest impact in this respect, losing 2.2% of demand in the first half of the year (-80,478 customers). The fall in the British market on the island is of practically the same size (-2.7%). Lanzarote (-1.2%), for its part, absorbs the blow better as this market begins its downward turn.
Fewer tourists, higher spending
Observing the evolution of the numbers allows us to affirm that the old maxim is being fulfilled: fewer tourists are arriving, but with greater spending power. That is true, but it is also the case that the time will come when contracts with tour operators are renegotiated if the loss of tourists – healthy for the moment – is sustained over time. Having empty beds will lead the tour-operating giants to demand better prices from hoteliers and to design promotional policies that also provide some relief for customers.
Until that moment arrives, the average spend of €1,520 per tourist arriving between January and June exceeded by 0.6% the outlay made by visitors who chose the autonomous community in the same period last year. The sixth month of the year better reflects the unreal context in which contracts were signed while inflation had not yet tightened again following the market instability unleashed by Trump and Netanyahu. That 0.6% increase for the half-year shot up to 4.6% for June alone; a rise of 4.7% if average daily spend is analysed.
Shorter stays
The loss of purchasing power that rising prices inflict on household incomes is also reflected in the length of trips. If less money is available, it becomes necessary to reduce the number of days spent at the destination. The average for the first half of the year was 7.94 days, which is already 0.34% less than in the first half of last year; in June it fell even further, to 7.60 days.
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