Overnight stays in tourist apartments soared 473.6% in the Canary Islands in April compared to the same month last year to exceed 1.9 million, which places the islands as the leading destination, according to provisional data from the National Institute of Statistics (INE).

Compared to April 2019, before the health pandemic began, the market has not yet recovered and overnight stays are 11.5% lower.

With an average stay of 6.84 days, overnight stays were led by foreign tourists (1.6 million) ahead of nationals (265,973), with 67.1% occupancy and a total of 10,321 employees.

By tourist areas, the island of Tenerife was the preferred destination, with 613,973 overnight stays, while the coast of Barcelona had the highest occupancy rate, with 86.6% of the apartments on offer.

The tourist spots with the highest number of overnight stays in April are San Bartolomé de Tirajana (Gran Canaria), Arona (Tenerife) and Tías (Lanzarote).

The INE has also released the Tourist Apartment Price Index (IPAP) which increased by 13.8% in April compared to the same month in 2021 and the Rural Tourism Price Index (IPTR) by 8.8%. On the contrary, the Campsite Price Index (IPAC) fell 0.5%.

With all this, overnight stays in all Spanish collective tourist accommodation (hotels, apartments, campsites, rural tourism accommodation and hostels) increased by 399.5% in April in the annual rate. Those of residents rose 207% and those of non-residents, 856.8%.

The main issuing markets in the set of regulated tourist accommodation were the British (with 24.7% of the total overnight stays by non-residents), German (18.5%) and French (9.6%).

Overnight stays by non-residents in tourist apartments represented 66.5% of the total, with the United Kingdom being the main source market with more than 1 million overnight stays, followed distantly by Germany with 392,889.

After the Canary Islands, Madrid was the autonomous community with the highest occupancy, with 59.2% of the apartments offered.