- Domestic Tourism Emerges as Backbone of Ghana’s Accommodation Market
Domestic travellers are sustaining Ghana’s accommodation industry, accounting for more than 98 per cent of recorded guests between November 2024 and February 2025, as foreign demand remained comparatively thin despite its higher potential value.
Accommodation establishments recorded approximately 8.09mn domestic guests over the four-month period, compared with about 137,800 foreign visitors, according to the Ghana Statistical Service’s Accommodation Unit Survey.
Monthly domestic guest numbers ranged from 1.87m to 2.17m, while foreign guests remained below 40,000 in each of the four months.
The disparity challenges the conventional portrayal of Ghana’s tourism and hospitality industry as primarily dependent on international visitors.
Although foreign arrivals remain important for foreign-exchange earnings and international destination visibility, the GSS data show that Ghanaian residents provide the volume that keeps much of the accommodation industry operating.
The survey covered 1,085 licensed and unlicensed accommodation establishments selected from a national frame of 9,602 businesses across all 16 regions.
Domestic guests were particularly dominant in hostels, which recorded their highest monthly number of 934,157 in January. Hotels attracted the majority of foreign guests, recording 34,144 international visitors in November the highest figure during the period.
The difference reflects two distinct markets.
Domestic travellers provide scale, but foreign visitors generally stay longer. Ghanaian hotel guests spent about two nights on average, while foreign hotel guests typically stayed for between three and four nights.
This means international visitors, although significantly fewer, potentially generate more accommodation revenue and wider spending per trip.
Longer visits create additional demand for food, transport, entertainment, cultural activities, retail and tour services. The economic value of a visitor must therefore be assessed not only by counting arrivals but also by measuring how long the visitor stays and how much activity that stay generates.
Foreign visitors in budget hotels recorded an average stay of 9.4 nights in February, while some northern regions reported exceptionally long stays among relatively small numbers of international guests.
The results suggest Ghana requires separate strategies for its domestic and international tourism markets rather than treating all visitors as a single category.
Domestic travellers are likely to be more sensitive to room prices, transport costs and the affordability of attractions. International travellers may place greater emphasis on air connectivity, safety, service quality, digital booking systems and complete destination experiences.
For domestic tourism, the opportunity lies in converting travel for education, business, religious events, funerals, festivals and family visits into structured tourism expenditure.
Affordable accommodation packages, improved road connections and coordinated events could encourage more residents to stay overnight rather than make same-day trips.
Central Region demonstrates the potential of domestic demand. It recorded the country’s highest number of resident guests, reaching 872,358 in January 2025, while maintaining room occupancy of about 60 per cent and bed occupancy above 70 per cent throughout the period.
Greater Accra attracted the largest number of foreign visitors, peaking at 30,588 in January. It also generated the highest accommodation revenue, but its room occupancy remained between 41 and 47.6 per cent.
This indicates that high room prices and international demand do not automatically translate into full utilisation.
The national accommodation market recorded room occupancy of between 44.1 and 46.6 per cent. Hotels performed below that average, with occupancy remaining between 36.4 and 37.8 per cent.
Hostels, supported overwhelmingly by domestic guests, recorded occupancy rates above 91 per cent throughout the period.
The contrast points to a market increasingly shaped by affordability and practical travel needs.
Ghana’s tourism strategy has often focused on international campaigns, diaspora travel and major seasonal events. These initiatives remain necessary, particularly because foreign visitors stay longer and bring external purchasing power.
But the GSS findings show that domestic tourism cannot be treated as a secondary market.
The immediate policy challenge is to strengthen the domestic base while increasing the value and duration of international visits.
Hotels must design products that Ghanaian travellers can afford without undermining revenue, while tourism authorities must develop attractions and events that encourage both domestic and foreign visitors to remain at destinations longer.
Ghana’s hospitality industry is currently being carried by residents. Its next stage of growth will depend on whether it can deepen that domestic market while attracting significantly more foreign visitors who stay longer, spend more and travel beyond Greater Accra.
