Overnight stays at hotels in Iceland in January were nearly 291,000 or approximately 1.4% more than in 2024 when they were 287,000. Overnight stays increased significantly in most regions except in the Capital region where they decreased by 4.4%.
The greatest increases were in the North (34.7%), East (24.0%) and Southwest (20.0%). Overnight stays also increased by 10.4% in the South and 7.6% in the West and Westfjords. Overall, overnight stays decreased by approximately 9 thousand in the Capital region while increasing by a total of 13 thousand in the rest of the country.
Supply of hotel bedrooms declined in all regions except the North where they increased by 2.8%. In total, supply of bedrooms declined by 1.9% for the country in general with the greatest decrease occurring in the East (-24.3%). Changes were less significant in other regions as the number of bedrooms decreased by 3.8% in the South, 3.2% in the West and Westfjords, 1.4% in the Southwest and 0.7% in the Capital region.
On the other hand, occupancy rates increased in all regions except in the Capital region (-1.2 percentage points). Overall occupancy rate for the country increased by 1.9 percentage points with the greatest increase being in the East (7.3 percentage points). Occupancy rates also increased markedly in the South (5.9 percentage points). Moreover, occupancy rates increased by 3.4 percentage points in the Southwest, 3.1 percentage points in the North and 2.0 percentage points in the West and Westfjords.
All accommodations
When all accommodations are considered the total number of registered overnight stays in January were nearly 401,000. This was an increase of 2.8% compared with the same month in 2024 when the total was nearly 390,000. Most of overnight stays were registered in hotels and guesthouses or nearly 328,000 (291,000 in hotels and 37,000 in guesthouses). The rest, or 73,000, was attributable to other types of accommodation (camping sites, cottages, etc.).
Revision of data categorisation by nationality
Data on overnight stays by nationality is currently undergoing revisions. While this analysis is in process no data on the number of overnight stays by nationality will be published. It should be noted, however, that this revision does not affect the total number of overnight stays (by type of accommodation or region) but rather only the breakdown by nationality.
Furthermore, data on overnight stays by nationality is used as input in estimating the number of unlisted overnight stays. For that reason, it is also not possible to publish results on the number of unlisted overnight stays for the month of January 2024.
About the data
All numbers for 2025 are preliminary except data on overnight stays at hotels which are preliminary for January 2025.