Overseas travel to and from Ireland increased in December 2020. In December 2020 there were 164,400 overseas passenger arrivals and 178,800 overseas passenger departures (See Table 1). These compare with 103,900 arrivals and 96,800 departures in November 2020, increases of 58.3% and 84.7% respectively (See Tables 2A and 2B). Overseas travel in December 2020 remained considerably lower than in December 2019, when there were 1,372,600 arrivals and 1,383,800 departures, falls of 88.0% and 87.1% respectively.
Of the 164,400 persons arriving in Ireland in December 2020, 135,900 (82.7%) arrived by air and 28,500 (17.3%) arrived by sea. Of the 178,800 persons departing Ireland, 156,100 (87.3%) departed by air and 22,800 (12.7%) departed by sea.
Of those arriving in Ireland, 65,100 (39.6%) came by cross-channel routes, 79,100 (48.1%) by continental routes, 11,700 (7.1%) by transatlantic routes and 8,500 (5.1%) by other overseas routes. The corresponding figures for those departing Ireland were 54,800 (30.6%), 107,100 (59.9%), 7,900 (4.4%) and 9,100 (5.1%) respectively.
The most important staging countries for persons travelling overseas to Ireland were Great Britain (65,100), the Netherlands (14,700) and Spain (13,100). The most important staging countries for persons travelling overseas from Ireland were Great Britain (54,800), Spain (19,200) and Poland (17,200).
In the year 2020, 4,460,200 persons arrived in Ireland from overseas and 4,452,600 persons departed. These represent decreases of 77.9% and 78.0% respectively compared to 2019.
