Thursday 19 / June / 2025
Muscat: India has jumped two places to become the second most popular destination for travellers from the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region in the second quarter of 2018, a new report shows.
Wego, the largest online travel marketplace in the MENA region, released the MENA Traveller Destination Leaderboards for Q2-2018, highlighting the rise and fall in popularity of travel destinations amongst travellers from the MENA region.
Egypt retained its position as the most popular destination of Q2 out of 25 destinations ranked, thanks to continued patronage of both leisure and business travellers from the MENA region.
India jumped a significant two places to the number 2 position, up from #4 in Q2 2017. This is said to be a result of the holy month of Ramadan beginning mid-May and many Gulf-based Indian expats who chose to travel to their home country during this period (or immediately afterwards). Similarly, Pakistan jumped two places, from number 11 to number 9 for the same reason.
Oman, meanwhile, jumped a huge three spots from the bottom to rise to 22. Here's the full list of countries, ranked by Wego's report:
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Saudi Arabia has been pushed down to the #3 spot, but remains a popular destination in Q2 among domestic and international visitors who travel for business, leisure and Umrah purposes. Turkey was also moved down one spot in Q2 2018 to #4 position, but the nation is looking especially affordable for GCC-based travellers this year, owing to continued currency weakness and tourism numbers reflecting strong demand.
Overall, the UAE retains its spot as the fifth most popular destination; a position that it has been holding on to for the last four quarters. Dubai specifically improved its ranking by one position in 2018 with maximum visitors interest stemming from KSA, at the expense of Alexandria which dropped by two places. At the same time, visitors from Kuwait to Dubai declined this quarter.
Travel to the Philippines from the MENA region saw strong growth in Q2 2018. This appears to have been caused by expats travelling home during Ramadan, marketing efforts by the Philippine Department of Tourism and the opening up of new airline routes.
The destination rankings in the report are derived from the flight and hotel search activity of millions of Wego’s apps and websites users during the second quarter of 2018.
