Inbound & Tourism Spending
What do inbound visitors spend on, and what do they come for? This theme brings together consumption-trend, visitor-arrival and people-flow data, plus the articles that read them.
Related articles6
Q.Which countries do most of Nara's foreign visitors come from?
In 2024, China was by far the top source of overnight foreign visitors to Nara City, with 153,700 people (45.2% of the total). The United States ranked second (38,300; 11.3%) and Taiwan third (27,800; 8.2%). Nationwide, however, South Korea led all markets in 2024 (about 8.82 million), so Nara's profile differs notably from Japan's overall.
Q.How many tourists visit Nara each year? Has it recovered to pre-COVID levels?
Nara Prefecture recorded 43.62 million tourist visits in 2024, up 9.3% (3.71 million) year on year. That was 1.40 million, or 3.1%, below the 45.02 million recorded in 2019 — a recovery to about 96.9% of the pre-COVID level. Tourism spending, meanwhile, reached a record ¥206.0 billion, 14.0% above 2019.
Q.Why is Nara a "day-trip" destination?
In 2024, Nara Prefecture recorded roughly 2.83 million overnight stays (2,834,450), ranking 44th of Japan's 47 prefectures. Visitors stay in neighboring Kyoto (about 12.1x more stays) and Osaka (about 20.3x) and treat Nara as a day trip. In Nara City, 86.3% of visitors come only for the day — a striking gap given the prefecture drew about 43.62 million visitors in 2024.
Q.What Japanese food do inbound visitors most want to eat?
The thing inbound visitors most look forward to before their trip is "eating Japanese food" — about 82% (JTA, 2024), ahead of "shopping" (about 63%) as the single biggest reason to visit. In a survey of what they actually ate in Osaka, ramen ranked first.
Q.What do inbound visitors spend the most on?
In 2024, inbound visitors spent a record ¥8.13 trillion in Japan. By category, lodging was the largest at 33.6%, followed by shopping (29.5%) and food & drink (21.5%). Spending per person was about ¥227,000 (JTA final annual report, 2024).
Q.After a trip, do people re-order the local products they loved online?
Yes — a fair number of travelers do re-order a regional product online after getting home. But there is almost no nationwide public data that directly measures whether *domestic* travelers buy again online after visiting a place. The closest figure comes from a survey of inbound visitors: 58.2% of those who liked a souvenir kept buying it after returning home, and 24.4% of them did so via cross-border EC or mail order (MAFF, 2019).
Related datasets11
- インバウンドJNTO
JNTO Visitor Arrivals Statistics
Monthly statistics on foreign visitor arrivals to Japan published by the Japan National Tourism Organization (JNTO), broken down by country/region. The most fundamental time-series data on inbound demand, with market profiles and trend analyses. Note these are national figures, not Nara-specific.
Questions this data can answer
What are the monthly trends in visitor arrivals by country/region?
XLSXPDFHTMLUpdated2026-08-23 - インバウンド観光庁
Inbound Consumption Trend Survey (Japan Tourism Agency)
A quarterly survey of foreign visitor spending in Japan (formerly the Foreign Visitor Consumption Trend Survey). Publishes total travel consumption, per-capita spending by country/region, and breakdowns by category such as lodging, dining, and shopping. The baseline data for understanding the scale and structure of inbound consumption.
Questions this data can answer
How much does a foreign visitor spend per trip on average?
XLSXPDFUpdated2026-08-23 - 宿泊観光庁
Overnight Stay Statistics Survey (Japan Tourism Agency)
A statistical survey of accommodation facilities by the Japan Tourism Agency. Reports total guest nights, foreign guest nights, and room occupancy rates by prefecture — one of the few official datasets that lets you compare Nara's lodging demand with the rest of Japan. Monthly preliminary figures and annual final figures are published.
Questions this data can answer
How have total and foreign guest nights in Nara changed over time?
XLSXPDFUpdated2026-08-23 - 消費額観光庁
Travel and Tourism Consumption Trend Survey (JTA)
The JTA’s core quarterly statistics on domestic travel — trip counts, overnight stays and spending. Annual prefecture-level tables let you compare spending per trip and travel styles for visitors to Nara nationwide.
Questions this data can answer
How much does a domestic traveler to Nara spend per trip?
XLSXPDFUpdated2026-08-23 - インバウンド国土交通省
FF-Data (Inbound Visitor Flow Data)
Origin–destination tables showing how international visitors move between prefectures — from port of entry through each destination to departure — by nationality and transport mode. Quantifies how visitors flow into Nara via Osaka and Kyoto.
Questions this data can answer
From which prefectures do international visitors flow into Nara?
XLSXUpdated2026-08-23 - 奈良市奈良市
Nara City Tourist Visitation Survey
The city’s annual count of tourist arrivals, more granular than the prefectural survey. Published as PDF reports plus Excel open data, covering the overnight/day-trip split and international guest numbers.
Questions this data can answer
How many tourists visit Nara City annually and how is it trending?
PDFXLSXUpdated2026-08-23 - 奈良公園奈良県
Nara Free Wi-Fi Service Areas
Data on free Wi-Fi coverage across the Nara Park area, provided as an area-map PDF and a spot-list CSV — useful for guiding international visitors on connectivity.
Questions this data can answer
Where can you use free Wi-Fi around Nara Park?
PDFCSVUpdated2026-08-23 - インバウンド奈良県
Nara Prefecture International Visitor Estimates
Estimates of international visitors to Nara, derived by applying the prefecture’s visitation rate to national arrival figures. Annual Excel series from 2012 with nationality breakdowns — a first-stop overview of Nara’s inbound scale.
Questions this data can answer
How many international tourists are estimated to visit Nara each year?
XLSXHTMLUpdated2026-08-23 - 宿泊奈良県
Nara Prefecture Lodging Statistics Survey
The prefecture’s survey of lodging trends since 2009: guest-nights by area, facility type and month, occupancy rates, average length of stay, plus international guest numbers.
Questions this data can answer
How are guest-nights trending by area and month in Nara?
PDFUpdated2026-08-23 - 観光客数奈良県
Nara Prefecture Tourist Dynamics Survey Report
Annual survey reports on tourist movements in Nara Prefecture, covering visitor numbers by major tourist site, day-trip vs. overnight ratios, and foreign visitor counts. Reports are available from 2006 onward, enabling long-term time-series comparison.
Questions this data can answer
How has the annual number of tourists to Nara changed over time?
PDFXLSXUpdated2026-08-23 - ダッシュボード奈良県
Nara Tourism Data Portal "Mirunara"
Nara Prefecture's tourism data visualization portal. Combines multiple data sources to show visitor profiles, length of stay, lodging trends, credit card spending, and consumption patterns by country/region, with comparisons to national statistics from JNTO and the Japan Tourism Agency. Some detailed data is access-restricted.
Questions this data can answer
Where do visitors to Nara come from and which routes do they take?
HTMLPDFUpdated2026-08-23