Vietnam tourism growing faster than in Thailand, Japan

Friday, June 16, 2023

An online travel company sees tourism in Vietnam growing faster than in Thailand, but the kingdom could maintain its edge by removing visa friction, opening more flight routes and creating business reasons for travel.

Vietnam grew its share of inbound travel in the first five months of 2023, coming in third behind Japan and Thailand among Asian destinations.

It jumped from fifth place in 2019, the last year of pre-pandemic travel.

Thailand topped online travel company list in 2022, but was quickly overtaken by Japan, which reopened its borders in October.

Thailand has welcomed over 11 million visitors this year, already surpassing 2022.

With inbound, outbound and domestic travel recovered, Thailand’s task is to sustainably grow its tourism industry, which in 2019 accounted for about a fifth of gross domestic product.

Morgenshtern told reporters on Thursday while South Korea has sent the biggest group of inbound travelers to Thailand, more Koreans are traveling to Japan and Vietnam.

He attributed this to Korean factories that opened in Vietnam in the past two decades, establishing a community of expatriates who spread word about Vietnam back home.

The online travel company operations are based in Bangkok with more than 3,000 employees, about half of its global workforce.

Chinese tourists, who once topped inbound Thailand travel, have come in third behind Koreans and Malaysians.

Thailand bookings from China have recovered to about 80% of 2019 levels on online travel company platform, spiking immediately after China’s reopening in January but flattening in subsequent months as visa restrictions and airline capacity remained tight.

A reopening spike also benefited Japan, which has enjoyed two years of pent-up travel demand since October.

Citing New York City as a proxy for a megacity where tourism flattened higher than in 2019, Morgenshtern, the chief executive of the online travel company saw sustainable growth for travel to Japan because of its differentiated offerings.

Japan is versatile. People come to Thailand for the weather, the beach and the parties, but Japan has Disneyland, cities and business travel, he said.

Booking saw record revenue in 2022 of $17 billion, with gross travel bookings worth $121.3 billion.

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