High-angle aerial view of crowded Clearwater Beach in Florida with white sand, blue ocean, palm trees, and Pier 60 winding path. — Clearwater Beach, Florida Credit: Shutterstock

Florida attracted slightly fewer tourists in the first quarter than during the same period last year, data from the state’s tourism marketing agency released Tuesday show.

Visit Florida reported an estimated 39.89 million people journeyed to the state between January 1 and March 31, down 1 percent from the first quarter of 2025.

Florida’s figures remain bolstered by people traveling from other states, which accounted for 36.54 million, or nearly 92 percent, of the visitors in the first quarter. The quarterly total is 1.2 percent fewer than in the first quarter of 2025 and the lowest for the quarter since 2022 when 36.39 million people traveled to Florida as the nation was still emerging from the COVID-19 pandemic.

Before the quarterly numbers were released, Visit Florida President and CEO Bryan Griffin told members of the public-private agency’s executive committee they have seen an increase in people driving to Florida, with some flying to airports outside the state and then motoring south.

“We need to let those numbers settle before we know for sure,” Griffin said in a conference call last Wednesday.

There were 2.29 million overseas travelers to Florida in the first quarter of this year, up 8.5 percent from the same period of 2025, and 1.05 million Canadians, 12.1 percent fewer than last year.

The Canadian figures would have been more pronounced without changes to the 2025 figures.

Included with the first quarter report, Visit Florida revised the overall count for 2025 from 143.29 million to 143.33 million.

Among the changes was an increase in Canadian travelers from 2.9 million to 3.17 million for the year and 1.06 million to 1.2 million for the first quarter of 2025.

“The revised data reflects delayed final reporting from kiosk issues at Ontario ports resulting in an undercount of U.S. visits in quarterly travel surveys,” a release from Visit Florida stated. “The updated analysis also more accurately captures evolving Canadian travel patterns, including travelers driving into the United States before flying onward to Florida.”

The overseas count is the most ever for the quarter, topping the 2.28 million in 2019, the year before the pandemic.

Griffin called the overseas figures “phenomenal, with travel from the United Kingdom up 17.2 percent from the first quarter of 2025 and from Ireland by 14.5 percent in the same time.

“We continue to lean in and encourage and invite people from overseas, and to develop the way that we do business there and the marketing efforts that we have there,” Griffin said. “And we’ve got some great things planned for the year ahead.”

Brazil has surpassed the United Kingdom in the past two years as the top source of overseas travelers. In 2025, Brazil accounted for 10.5 percent of overseas travelers. The United Kingdom was at 9.7 percent last year.

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