1.4 Million Tourists to Bali, Australian Whites Dominate, Indian Tourists Down

ILLUSTRATION UNSPLASH/Mahmud Ahsan

DENPASAR - The Central Statistics Agency (BPS) Bali recorded that as many as 1.4 million foreign tourists (wisman) have visited Bali during the first quarter of 2026 or January-March.

"The cumulative visits from January to March, the number of foreign tourists who came directly to Bali has reached more than 1.4 million or 1,466,546 visits," said Head of BPS Bali Agus Gede Hendrayana Hermawan.

Agus Gede in Denpasar, Tuesday, said that the number meant an increase between the first quarter of 2026 and the first quarter of 2025, which was 1,451,445 tourist visits.

"So compared to January-March 2025, the number of visits in January-March 2026 is still recorded to have increased by 1.04 percent," he said.

If viewed from its nationality, BPS Bali found that during the first three months of 2026, Australian tourists dominated with 354,079 visits or increased by 5.76 percent compared to January-March 2025.

Other nationalities are China which increased by 20.22 percent with a total of 157,242 visits, India experienced a decrease of 0.25 percent with 116,943 visits, South Korea decreased by 13.32 percent with 68,873 visits, then from England experienced a decrease of 4.76 percent with 63,364 visits.

Although the January-March 2026 condition compared to the same period previously showed a positive trend, Agus Gede revealed that the monthly visits of foreign tourists actually decreased.

During March 2026, the number of direct tourist arrivals to Bali was 472,070 visits or recorded a decrease of 4.11 percent compared to February.

"There is a slight difference in the pattern over the past three years, if in 2024 from January to February to March it tends to continue to increase, in 2025 it fluctuates from January then in February it decreases and then in March it increases again, in fact in 2026 this tendency is decreasing from January to February to March, hopefully in the coming months there will be an increase and what is the geopolitical situation back to normal," said Agus Gede.

BPS Bali sees several events in March 2026 related to tourism visits such as holidays and flight cancellations due to conflicts in the Middle East.

Thankfully, in that month there was a luxury cruise ship docked at Benoa Port which boosted tourist visits.

During March 2026 alone, BPS Bali photographed the most foreign tourists who came to Bali from Australia with 119,777 visits or an increase of 20.35 percent compared to February, followed by India with 42,460 visits or an increase of 14.35 percent.

"Then from China, 32,497 visits, which decreased by 58.79 percent, the decline is quite high, probably because in February there was a Chinese New Year celebration so that the arrival of Chinese tourists was relatively high and then returned to normal in March," he said.

Furthermore, British tourists increased by 25.32 percent or 24,206 visits, and the United States increased by 37.05 percent with 23,003 visits.

"So the proportion from Australia is very dominant at 25.37 percent or more than a quarter of the tourists who came to Bali were from Australia for the last March," said Agus Gede.