What EU country welcomed the most seaborne passengers in 2023?

Italian ports recorded the highest number of seaborne passengers in the European Union last year, with 85.4 million passengers touching down in the Mediterranean country, according to new data from Eurostat.

This equates to more than a fifth (22%) of all seaborne passengers in the European Union, the data showed.

Greece placed second, with just under 75 million seaborne passengers visiting the country, or 19% of the EU total, followed by Denmark (41.2 million passengers).

Other countries to welcome a sizeable number of seaborne passengers last year included Croatia (33.8 million), Spain (31.7 million), Germany (28.5 million), Sweden (24.9 million) and France (22.2 million).

Ports across the EU

Overall, in 2023, ports across the European Union welcomed 395.3 million passengers last year, a 5.8% increase on 2022 (374.0 million).

The total number of passengers in 2023 is down, however, on pre-COVID levels, with numbers 5.5% lower than in 2019.

Some 11 countries collectively accounted for 97% of the EU’s maritime passenger activity, while Italy, Greece, and France saw the largest year-on-year increases in passenger numbers, with gains of 6.5 million, 4.8 million, and 3.2 million, respectively.

As regards the busiest passenger port in the EU, Messina in Italy tops the list, handling some 11.3 million passengers last year, followed by Reggio di Calabria (11.1 million), also in Italy, and Piraeus in Greece (9.6 million). Read more here.

Seaborne passengers by EU country, 2023 (in thousands)

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