Thursday, 28 May 2026
Slovakia’s organised tourism market recorded a slight slowdown in 2025, although travel demand remained historically strong, according to new data published by the Statistical Office of the Slovak Republic. Despite a year-on-year decline in client numbers, last year still marked the second strongest performance for Slovak tour operators and travel agencies since the beginning of the millennium.
More than 1.2 million people used the services of Slovak travel agencies and tour operators during 2025, representing a 3.6 percent decline compared with the record-breaking results achieved in 2024. However, organised tourism volumes remained above pre-pandemic levels recorded in 2018 and 2019.
Outbound tourism continued to dominate the market, accounting for 84 percent of organised travel demand. More than one million Slovaks travelled abroad through organised tours, making 2025 the second-best year for outbound tourism in the past 25 years. While the number of outbound travellers fell by 3.5 percent year-on-year, demand remained more than 50 percent higher than before the pandemic.
Multi-day holidays with overnight stays remained the preferred option among Slovak travellers, although interest in shorter sightseeing trips and organised sporting events also increased. Same-day organised trips abroad represented around 7 percent of outbound travel volumes.
Turkey retained its position as the leading package holiday destination for Slovak travellers, attracting roughly one in five holidaymakers despite a 16 percent annual decline in visitor numbers to around 226,000 people. Egypt ranked second, welcoming nearly 124,000 Slovak tourists and recording strong growth both year-on-year and compared with 2019. Other leading destinations included Greece, Italy, Tunisia and Cyprus.
Among the ten most popular destinations, Egypt and Italy posted double-digit annual growth in visitor numbers. Meanwhile, travel demand to traditional destinations such as Czechia and Croatia declined compared with the previous year. Compared with pre-pandemic levels, Bulgaria and Croatia recorded some of the sharpest decreases in organised travel demand.
The data also pointed to rising interest in long-haul and exotic destinations. Countries including Oman and the United Arab Emirates recorded higher visitor numbers than before the pandemic, supported by expanding direct flight connections and additional charter services from Slovakia. Although annual figures declined slightly, destinations such as Vietnam and the Dominican Republic reported tourism volumes more than twenty times higher than in 2019.
Inbound tourism continued to lag behind outbound demand. Around 127,000 foreign visitors arrived in Slovakia through Slovak travel agencies and tour operators in 2025, down 3 percent year-on-year and significantly below pre-pandemic levels. Most foreign visitors opted for same-day trips without overnight stays. Visitors from Austria, the United States and Germany accounted for nearly three quarters of all inbound arrivals organised through Slovak operators.
Domestic organised tourism also weakened overall, with participant numbers falling by 6 percent to around 77,000 travellers. However, same-day domestic package trips recorded notable growth, increasing by almost 20 percent year-on-year and more than doubling compared with 2019. The strongest growth in this segment was recorded by travel companies based in the Žilinský kraj region.
Despite softer client volumes, revenues in the organised tourism sector continued to rise. Total turnover from package travel services increased by 4 percent year-on-year to nearly EUR 1.1 billion, exceeding pre-pandemic levels by 46 percent. Outbound tourism generated more than 94 percent of total sector turnover.
Domestic tourism recorded the strongest annual turnover growth, rising 15 percent to EUR 37 million, while outbound tourism revenues climbed to approximately EUR 1 billion. Inbound tourism was the only segment to report declining revenues, falling nearly 13 percent year-on-year to EUR 26 million.
Companies headquartered in Bratislavský kraj continued to dominate the sector, accounting for the majority of turnover in both outbound and inbound tourism activities.
Source: SOSK
