Solomon Islands records best post-COVID visitor arrival figures

Tourism Solomons is celebrating the Solomon Islands best visitor arrival figures in the post-COVID period with numbers recorded for January to December 2025 jumping by more than 13 percent over 2024.

The figures, released by the Solomon Islands National Statistics Office (SINSO), show a total of 28,548 international arrivals across the year reflecting a 13.6 percent increase over the 25,130 figure recorded for the same period in 2024.

The 2025 result sits just 382 under the record 28,930 arrivals recorded in 2019, shortly before the Solomon Islands government enacted an 800‑day border closure to prevent COVID‑19 entering the country.

Of note, the SINSO Purpose of Visit (POV) data shows a substantial 34.3 percent surge in Holiday & Vacation travel in 2025, rising from 7,145 in 2024 to 9,602.

Tourism Solomons Acting CEO, Dagnal Dereveke attributed the uplift to the impact the tourist board’s sustained marketing and promotional activity is having across its key markets.

The SINSO figures show Australian numbers for 2025 peaked at 9242, an increase of 15.4 percent over the 8004 figure achieved same period in 2024 and accounting for 32.3 percent of all arrivals.

New Zealand visitor numbers also continued their upward trend, increasing from 1645 in 2024 to reach 1882, an increase of 14.4 percent, these figures following on from 12 percent and 11 percent gains for October and November, respectively.

Arrivals from Fiji remained steady, the 2134 figure recorded showing an increase of just 0.09 percent over the 2132 figure recorded in 2024.

The biggest increase for all markets was seen with visitor arrivals from China which rose from 2134 in 2024 to reach 3512, an increase of 64.5 percent.

Tourism Solomons Acting CEO, Dagnal Dereveke said the new SINSO data was confirmation  international interest in the Solomon Islands is rebuilding strongly and very much in line with strategic growth targets.

August and September, he said were the destination’s strongest months for visitation, 3090 and 2991 visitors respectively, a factor Mr Dereveke attributed to the Solomon Islands hosting of the Pacific Ministers Water and Wastewater Management Meeting in August, and  54^th Pacific Islands Forum Leaders Meeting in September.

“Our focus remains fixed on rebuilding and growing arrivals from our key source markets, and the 2025 overall result show clear progress toward returning to, and exceeding, pre‑COVID levels,” he said.