A travel expert has shared the top tourist destinations which soared in popularity in 2024.

Seamus McCauley, head of public affairs at Holiday Extras, said his research has shown the countries with an increase in tourists.

He said: “Places that are most up this year so far include the Greek islands, Catalonia and Zanzibar. Most of these places want tourists, rather than the ones that are trying to discourage them.

“Teva in Montenegro and Shanghai in China also come up strongly in our data. But that’s the function of the Chinese tourism policy. China has made it much easier to travel to Shanghai.

“Other places include Marrakesh in Morocco, Tirana in Albania, which is explicitly very keen to have more visitors, and then various places like Romania, Agadir, Paris, Estonia and Belgrade in Serbia.

“Tenerife and the Canary Islands remain the single biggest destination for UK tourism, but if tourism is discouraged, people are going to respond accordingly.”

This comes after a series of overtourism protests held in various countries in Europe which has led some tourists to look for other places to holiday.

Residents have been angered by the amount of tourists visiting their beaches and cities, many have struggled to keep up with the visitors.

Some popular tourist destinations do not have the right infrastructure to support growing tourism and protesters said the growth was unsustainable and asked tourists to “go home”.

Barcelona, Amsterdam, and the Canary Islands introduced measures to combat overtourism which has impacted their levels of visitors.

However, Mr McCauley said that other countries have expressed their need for more tourism and have encouraged visitors leading to more tourists.

According to Statista, the top five places for Brits to go on holiday are:

1. Spain

2. France

3. Italy

4. Greece

5. Portugal

6. United States of America

7. Republic of Ireland

8. Turkey

9. Poland

10. Netherlands