The number of foreign visitors arriving in Türkiye more than doubled in the first eight months of the year, as a buoyant August saw the critical tourism industry continuing its strong recovery from the slump due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Rebound this year has been driven by a major leap in demand from Europe, spearheaded by Germany and the United Kingdom, as well as Russia.

Arrivals in August alone jumped 58.3% from a year earlier to 6.3 million, official data showed Friday. The figure compared with 3.98 million foreign visitors in August 2021 and 1.81 million in the same month of 2020.

Around 29.3 million tourists arrived in Türkiye from January through August, marking a 108.5% climb from a year ago, on pace to roughly match the pre-pandemic levels of 2019, according to Culture and Tourism Ministry data.

The first eight-month figure stood at 14.1 million in 2021, 7.2 million in 2020, and 31 million in 2019.

The arrivals have been mainly backed by Russian visitors, who increasingly opted for Türkiye due to flight restrictions applied by Western countries after Russia invaded Ukraine, as well as tourists from Europe. However, the number of German and British visitors rose strongly this year.

Türkiye’s metropolis and a top tourist destination, Istanbul has been the top spot as it attracted 10.2 million foreign visitors through August, the data showed.

It was followed by the Mediterranean resort town of Antalya with 8.6 million visitors, while Edirne, a city in Türkiye northwest bordering Bulgaria and Greece, welcomed 3.1 million tourists.

At 3.85 million, tourists from Germany topped the list among nations and made up 13% of all visitors in the first eight months, with arrivals jumping 105.73% from a year ago.

Russians followed with just over 3 million, a 22.8% year-over-year increase, and Britons ranked third with 2.36 million, a whopping 2,120% surge from the same period in 2021, according to the data.

Among others, some 1.7 million Bulgarians and 1.5 million Iranians arrived in Türkiye in the first eight months. If Turkish citizens living abroad are added to the count, the January-August figure goes up to 32.5 million.

Germany ranked first in August as well with 858,265 arrivals, followed by Russia with 806,505 and United Kingdom with 550,156.

Tourism revenues are vital to Türkiye’s economy as the government’s economic program focuses on flipping the chronic current account deficits to a surplus, prioritizing exports, production and investments, and aiming to lower the increase in consumer prices.

The government raised its year-end targets in July to 47 million tourists and $37 billion (TL 680.7 billion) in revenues, up from its earlier targets of 45 million arrivals and $35 billion in income.

The number of foreign visitors soared 94.1% to 24.71 million last year when COVID-19 measures were eased compared to 2020. Tourism revenues doubled to almost $25 billion but remained well below the level recorded in 2019.

Russians and Ukrainians were the country’s first and third biggest sources of visitors, respectively, in 2021. Russians accounted for 19% of foreign visitors, with 4.7 million people, while Ukraine was the third-largest at 8.3%, with 2.1 million people.

Officials had hoped tourism this year could replicate or exceed the numbers from 2019, when some 52 million visitors – including about 7 million Russians and 1.6 million Ukrainians – brought in $34 billion in revenue.