Fewer tourists, more euros. That’s the paradox laid out in black and white by ISTAC’s second-quarter 2026 data for the Canary Islands: visitors spent €4.851 billion across the archipelago between April and June, up 10.2% on the same period in 2025, with average daily spending climbing to €181 from €157.9 the year before. Tenerife and Gran Canaria alone absorb six euros out of every ten of that total, 38.4% and 24.4% respectively.
In Gran Canaria, the case most closely studied by local economists, the picture is even sharper. Tourism revenue for the quarter hit a historic record for that period, €1,185.1 million, while visitor numbers fell 2.8% according to FRONTUR figures, to 991,642 people. What made up the difference, ISTAC data show, was average spending per tourist, up 4.51% to €1,383.91, and daily spending, up 4.13%. “The second-quarter figures show that Gran Canaria is keeping its tourism revenue practically stable despite the drop in visitor numbers, thanks to higher spending per visitor,” the island’s tourism councillor, Carlos Álamo, said, according to local media reports on August 12.
Behind the headline figure lies a reshuffling of source markets worth looking at closely. Dutch tourists are driving the growth: total spending from the Netherlands in Gran Canaria rose 34.44%, to €122.7 million, with average individual spending jumping 23.43% to €1,609.67. At the other end, Nordic markets recorded the sharpest decline, down 26.15% in total spending, while the UK and Germany show falling volumes offset by rising average spend per tourist, up 9.08% for German visitors.
It isn’t a one-quarter blip. Across the whole archipelago, overnight stays in tourist accommodation fell just 0.3% in July compared with 2025, while the number of available vacation rental homes dropped 15% over the past year, an effect likely tied in part to the new regional law on the tourist use of housing, in force since last December, which requires between five and ten years of residential use before a newly built home can become a holiday rental.
The risk, some analysts note, is that this “flight to value” mainly rewards the markets and islands that were already strongest, leaving behind those still dependent on volume. For now, though, the numbers say the Canary Islands are earning more while spending less on mass-market promotion, a shift in model measured euro by euro, quarter by quarter.
