International Travel 10 July

International travel covers the number and characteristics of overseas visitors and New Zealand resident travellers (short-term movements) entering or leaving New Zealand.

Key facts

Monthly arrivals - overseas visitors
Monthly arrivals - New Zealand-resident travellers
Annual arrivals
Border crossings

Monthly arrivals - overseas visitors

Overseas visitor arrivals were 190,600 in May 2025, an increase of 10,900 from May 2024. The biggest changes were in arrivals from:

• Australia (up 4,200)
• China (up 2,300)
• United States (up 1,300).

The total number of overseas visitor arrivals in May 2025 was 87 percent of the 219,300 in May 2019 (before the COVID-19 pandemic).

Of the 190,600 overseas visitor arrivals in May 2025:

• 45 percent were from Australia (compared with 42 percent in May 2019)
• 9 percent were from the United States (8 percent in May 2019)
• 9 percent were from China (13 percent in May 2019)
• 5 percent were from India (3 percent in May 2019)
• 3 percent were from the United Kingdom (3 percent in May 2019)
• 3 percent were from Singapore (2 percent in May 2019).

Monthly arrivals - New Zealand-resident travellers

New Zealand-resident traveller arrivals were 239,000 in May 2025, an increase of 15,600 from May 2024. The biggest changes were in arrivals from:

• Australia (up 6,800)
• Japan (up 2,300)
• Philippines (up 1,900)
• Indonesia (up 1,400)
• India (up 1,400)
• China (up 1,200).

The 239,000 New Zealand-resident traveller arrivals in May 2025 were a record for a May month. There were record arrivals, for a May month, from destinations including Australia (98,500), Fiji (16,000), and China (12,300).

The total number of New Zealand-resident traveller arrivals in May 2025 was 102 percent of the 235,200 in May 2019 (before the COVID-19 pandemic).

Of the 239,000 New Zealand-resident traveller arrivals in May 2025:

• 42 percent were from Australia (compared with 43 percent in May 2019)
• 7 percent were from Fiji (7 percent in May 2019)
• 6 percent were from the United States (8 percent in May 2019)
• 5 percent were from China (5 percent in May 2019)
• 4 percent were from the Cook Islands (4 percent in May 2019)
• 4 percent were from Japan (2 percent in May 2019)
• 4 percent were from India (2 percent in May 2019).

Annual arrivals

Overseas visitor arrivals were 3.37 million in the May 2025 year, an increase of 167,000 from the May 2024 year. The biggest changes were in arrivals from:

• Australia (up 145,000 to 1.44 million)
• China (up 24,000 to 250,000)
• United Kingdom (up 18,000 to 188,000)
• Japan (up 11,000 to 72,000).

New Zealand-resident traveller arrivals were 3.03 million in the May 2025 year, an increase of 136,000 from the May 2024 year. The biggest changes were in arrivals from:

• Australia (up 73,000 to 1.23 million)
• Indonesia (up 31,000 to 93,000)
• China (up 26,000 to 160,000)
• Japan (up 20,000 to 85,000)
• India (up 16,000 to 111,000)
• New Caledonia (down 12,000 to 1,000).

Border crossings

There were 931,900 border crossings in May 2025, made up of 437,100 arrivals and 494,800 departures. In May 2024 there were 876,400 border crossings.

May 2025 border crossings were 95 percent of the 983,600 in May 2019, before the COVID-19 pandemic.

Digital arrival card

A digital arrival card (New Zealand Traveller Declaration - NZTD) became available to travellers entering New Zealand from mid-July 2023, alongside the existing paper arrival card. Christchurch and Wellington airports were the first to use the NZTD, followed by Queenstown airport in late July 2023 and Auckland airport in late August 2023.

Data from July 2023 onwards therefore includes a growing proportion of digital responses. In May 2025, just over 3 in 5 of all traveller arrivals completed the digital NZTD.

The implementation of the NZTD has no impact on the range of statistical information available to international travel and migration customers.

Early and provisional international travel data

Each week, Stats NZ releases early and provisional international travel statistics - International travel (provisional) - to facilitate analysis of New Zealand's inbound and outbound tourism sectors.

This includes:

• weekly travel data for short-term overseas visitor and New Zealand-resident arrivals
• arrivals and departures data based solely on border crossings into and out of New Zealand
• stock estimates of visitors in New Zealand and New Zealand residents travelling overseas, based on arrivals and departures.

More data

Use Infoshare to access time-series data for international travel and migration:

Subject category: Tourism
Group: International travel and migration - ITM

Definitions and metadata

International travel - DataInfo+ gives general methodology used to produce international travel and migration statistics.

International travel concepts - DataInfo+ gives definitions of terms used in this release.

Subnational short-term NZ-resident arrivals - DataInfo+ gives methodology for determining the New Zealand-location information in short-term New Zealand-resident arrival records.

Technical enquiries

Alexis Hu
[email protected]

ISSN 2624-2710

Next release

International travel: June 2025 will be released on 15 August 2025.