Costa del Sol adds a million more overnight stays to July, nearing 18.4 million
The Turismo Costa del Sol bulletin, using INE data, puts January-July stays at 18,394,945, up 6.3%. Tourist apartments grew almost 30% in July alone.
- Overnight stays from January to July reached 18,394,945, up 1,089,104 on the same period in 2025.
- In July tourist apartments were up 29.8% in nights booked and campsites 17.6%, while hotels passed 77% average occupancy.
- Domestic travel grew 10.7% in July, so it pays to keep your listing and pricing sharp for Spanish guests, not only for overseas ones.
What happened
Accommodation on the Costa del Sol closed the first seven months of the year with 18,394,945 nights booked, 1,089,104 more than in the same period of 2025. That is a rise of 6.3% and the first time January-July stays have passed 18 million. The figures come from the Turismo Costa del Sol tourism bulletin, compiled from National Statistics Institute data. Worth noting: that series covers hotels, tourist apartments, rural houses and campsites, and does not count activity in holiday-let homes.
In July those establishments recorded 3,843,756 overnight stays, up 7.5%. Of those, 2.6 million were overseas visitors, up 6.1%, while domestic stays rose 10.7%. By type, tourist apartments increased nights booked by 29.8% and campsites by 17.6%; hotel average occupancy rose 4.2% to pass 77% of bed spaces. The province’s registered supply, which here does include holiday-let homes listed with the Andalusian Tourism Register, stands at 97,763 establishments and 720,612 bed spaces, up 3.5%, with 24,441 spaces added. The biggest source markets are Spain, the United Kingdom, Germany, Ireland and the Netherlands, the last of these down 6.1%, while Italy grew 12%, Poland 28.8%, Denmark 13%, Sweden 11.2% and Norway 11%.
What it means for your property in Málaga
Demand keeps growing, but so does supply: 24,441 new bed spaces in the province mean more listings chasing the same guest, and the 29.8% jump in tourist apartments in July is direct competition for a holiday-let home. In calendar terms, a strong summer for the destination does not guarantee a strong summer for your property. If your July occupancy was flat or down, the market was not the problem, and the answer lies in your pricing, your photos or where your listing ranks.
The source markets are more useful than the headline figure. Double-digit growth from Spanish travellers and from Italy, Poland, Denmark, Sweden and Norway is a reason to check which languages your listing description and automated replies cover, and not to treat the domestic market as an afterthought when pricing long weekends and shoulder season. Because the INE series quoted excludes holiday-let homes, the comparison that actually helps is against your own figures from last year: same dates, same average stay, same average nightly rate.
How I handle it in the properties I manage I use these bulletins to adjust pricing in PriceLabs rather than copying last year’s rates, and when the domestic market runs as hard as it did in July I drop the minimum stay so I don’t lose weekend breaks. The comparison I always come back to is my own property on the same dates last year.
Summary written with the help of AI and reviewed by Brian Donneys on 9 Sept 2026. General information, not legal or tax advice.