Despite the surge in air ticket and hotel prices at the end of the year, the popularity of travel to Japan continues to skyrocket.
Although the low yen phenomenon continues, winter is generally considered the peak season in Japan, and the prices of air tickets and accommodations have risen significantly, putting a significant burden on travel expenses.
On the 12th, airline ticket reservation platform Skyscanner reported that the most searched year-end travel destination for Korean travelers (based on departures from December 22nd to 31st) was Japan. In the rankings by city, Japan’s Sapporo ranked first.
Japan (16.9%) was the most popular travel destination as of the fourth quarter departure announced by Kyowon Tour.
An official from Kyowon Tour explained, “As the Japanese government began allowing package tours and implementing visa-free entry for Korean travelers from the middle of last year, it was selected as the most popular travel destination in the fourth quarter of that year,” adding, “It ranked first in the fourth quarter of this year as well.”
The most popular Japanese travel destination in the fourth quarter of this year was ‘Osaka’, followed by Fukuoka, Sapporo, Tokyo, and Okinawa. Demand for travel to small cities such as Matsuyama and Doamya has also increased noticeably.
A travel industry official said, “Traveling to Japan is not cheap these days, but the demand for traveling to Japan is constantly rising. Airline ticket prices have increased by at least 10 to 20 percent on average, and for concerts, Tokyo Dome, Osaka Kyocera Dome, and Fukuoka Dome have increased.” “There are a series of concerts being held at Korea’s main stadiums, so lodging costs have also risen significantly,” he said.
As a result of searching for round-trip flights from Incheon on weekdays (28th to 30th) on Naver Airline, round-trip flights to Sapporo started from 816,000 won, Tokyo flights started from 468,000 won, and Fukuoka started from 392,580 won.
Japan was the most popular overseas travel destination this year, and this phenomenon is expected to continue until 2024.
Hana Tour announced that the number of overseas travelers this year (January to November) was approximately 1.2 million, and looking at each region, Southeast Asia accounted for half (50%), followed by Japan (28%), Europe (9%), and China. (6%) was in that order. In other words, when viewed as a single country, Japan recorded the largest number of outbound passengers.
In fact, the cities with the highest number of people were ‘Kyushu, Japan’ and ‘Da Nang, Vietnam’, and among them, Da Nang, Sapporo, and Osaka were selected as the regions with the most reservations for ‘Hanapack 2.0’, a new concept package product.
According to statistics released by travel search engine Kayak, the country with the highest search volume this year was ‘Japan’, and the cities with the highest search volume among cities around the world were △Osaka, Japan, △Tokyo, Japan, and △Fukuoka, Japan.
The popular trend of travel to Japan in 2024 can also be seen in the 2024 travel trend released by Jeju Air.
According to a survey conducted by Jeju Air on 3,010 people, 2,809 people, or 93.3%, responded that they had plans to travel abroad next year, and Japan was their preferred travel destination with 1,526 out of 5,280 (28.9%), including multiple responses. was found to be the highest.
Meanwhile, the number of Korean tourists visiting Japan this year has surpassed the pre-pandemic figure, breaking a new figure. According to the Japan National Tourism Organization (JTNO)’s analysis of tourists visiting Japan from January to October of this year, the total number of Korean tourists visiting from January to October was 5.52 million, exceeding 5.13 million in 2019 before the coronavirus outbreak during the same period.
Source: Donga
Mark Jones is a world traveler and journalist for News Rebeat. With a curious mind and a love of adventure, Mark brings a unique perspective to the latest global events and provides in-depth and thought-provoking coverage of the world at large.