The short version, in eight cards
You read 20 million international arrivals in 2025. Only 9.15 million were foreigners. The other 11.07 million were Indians flying home.
21 Sep 2026 · 4 min read · 7 sourcesTen countries sent India the most foreign tourists in 2024. The dashed line is Indians coming home.
Source · Ministry of Tourism, India Tourism Data Compendium 2025 · accessed September 2026
You think
Twenty million foreigners visited India in 2025. That is what the arrivals headline sounds like.
Actually
55in every 100
Fewer than half were foreign
Source · Ministry of Tourism, India Tourism Data Portal · accessed September 2026
Foreign tourists were the clear majority in 2014 and 2019. Then they were not. These are the six years the ministry printed both halves.
Source · Ministry of Tourism, India Tourism Data Portal · accessed September 2026
At the counter every arrival states a purpose, and the ministry published three months of answers for 2025. But it never says whether it counted foreign tourists only, or everyone. Each square is one arrival in every hundred.
Source · Ministry of Tourism, Quarterly Tourism Snapshot, Jul-Sep 2025
share of India's foreign tourists, 2024
In 2024 the ministry published its last complete country table, so this is where the foreign half comes from. Two countries sent more than a third of it.
Source · Ministry of Tourism, India Tourism Data Compendium 2025 · accessed September 2026
Domestic visits per foreign tourist
468to 1
4,287 million domestic tourist visits in 2025. Against 9.15 million foreign tourists
In the other direction: 32.83 million Indians left the country as travellers that year. Three departures for every foreign arrival
Those nine countries are most of the foreign half. Now set it against domestic tourist visits, which means trips Indians make inside India.
Source · Ministry of Tourism, India Tourism Data Portal · accessed September 2026
