Jeju drew 2.24 mil. foreign tourists in 2025, 70% from China

Visitors walk along a coastal road in Dodu-dong, Jeju City, Jan. 4. Yonhap

More than 2.24 million foreign tourists visited Jeju Island last year, with Chinese travelers making up nearly 70 percent — underscoring the island’s continued reliance on visitors from China.

According to the Jeju Tourism Association on Saturday, foreign tourists accounted for 16.2 percent of the island’s total 13.86 million visitors last year. The number was up 17.7 percent from 2024 but remained more than 1.3 million below the record 3.6 million set in 2016.

Chinese tourists made up the largest share at 70.2 percent, followed by visitors from Taiwan, Japan, the United States, Hong Kong and Singapore. Visitors from Thailand totaled 10,532, the sharpest year-on-year increase at 349.7 percent, after Jeju Air resumed regular flights on the Bangkok route last year.

The number of Chinese tourists rose 14.8 percent compared to 2024, easing concerns about a potential downturn in Jeju following last year’s nationwide rollout of a temporary visa-free program for Chinese tour groups.

Jeju Island has long been a popular destination for Chinese tourists under a visa-free scheme that allows both individual and group travelers to stay for up to 30 days, even though most previously needed a visa to enter Korea.

Since last September, Chinese tour groups of three or more have also been allowed to enter Korea visa-free for stays of up to 15 days, a temporary policy set to run through June 30.

Vietnamese visitors were the only group to decline, dropping 21 percent compared to 2024, after VietJet Air canceled charter flights late that year following an incident in which 38 Vietnamese group tourists who entered Jeju visa-free went missing.

Jeju Special Self-Governing Province and the Jeju Tourism Organization said they will roll out country- and region-specific strategies this year to boost foreign arrivals, including plans to shift the Chinese-speaking market from large group tours to premium travel highlighting Jeju’s natural, cultural and culinary assets.