Eilat tourism numbers: the figures a business owner in the city should know
Eilat is a city of about 57 thousand residents that holds almost a fifth of the hotel rooms in Israel and about a third of the hotel stays in the country. According to the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS) the city has 52 hotels with 10,954 rooms, and their occupancy is far above the national average. According to the State Comptroller about nine out of ten jobs in the city are tied to tourism. On this page we gathered these numbers with a source for every figure and what each one means for your business.
The key numbers in one line
Eilat has 52 hotels with 10,954 rooms, which is about 19% of the hotel rooms in Israel according to the CBS. Their occupancy is far above the national average, and in peak season it gets close to 90%. Almost everything that moves in this city depends on tourism. That is the summary. The table gathers the numbers that come up in every conversation about Eilat, with the source and the period for each one.
The numbers on this page come from CBS publications on tourist hotels, from a State Comptroller report, and from an annual summary of passenger traffic at Ramon Airport. Each figure is accurate for the period written next to it and we update the page once a quarter. When you quote a number from here, quote the period too, because in Eilat the difference between one quarter and the next is very large.
| The figure | The value | Source and period |
|---|---|---|
| Tourist hotels in Eilat | 51 | CBS. September 2025 |
| Hotel rooms | 10,954 rooms. About 19% of the hotel rooms in Israel | CBS. September 2025 |
| Hotel stays | 4.7 million. 33.8% of hotel stays in Israel | CBS. January to August 2025 |
| Room occupancy | 67.8% in Eilat versus 52.7% nationwide | CBS. January to September 2025 |
| Occupancy by quarter | 66.4% · 82.4% · 87.9% · 71.9% | CBS. The four quarters of 2024 |
| Eilat hotel revenue | 3.216 billion shekels. 23% of hotel industry revenue | CBS. 2023 |
| Passengers at Ramon Airport | About 750 thousand passengers. Almost all of them on domestic flights and only about 7,500 on international flights | The 2025 summary on the local site Yom Yom BeEilat. The official figure sits with the Israel Airports Authority |
| Residents | About 57 thousand | CBS. 2023 |
| Businesses that depend on tourism | About nine out of every ten businesses in the city | The State Comptroller. September 2025 |
Hotels and rooms
Eilat has 52 tourist hotels with 10,954 rooms according to CBS data for September 2025. That is about 19% of the hotel rooms in Israel in one city of fewer than 60 thousand residents. Divide the rooms by the residents and you get roughly one hotel room for every five residents. It is hard to find another city in Israel with a ratio like that.
The figure counts tourist hotels only. Vacation apartments, rental villas and guest cabins are not included, so the real lodging supply in the city is larger. Even so, the hotel strip is the biggest concentration of guests in one place in the city, and all of them are within walking distance or a short drive of every business in Eilat.
One more thing about this number. 52 hotels are also 51 reception desks that guests walk up to every morning to ask what to do today and where to eat tonight. Working with a few hotels on the strip is a marketing channel in its own right, alongside Google, and anyone who works with attractions and water sports knows this from the field.
Why this matters to you. By Google's own explanation, local results are ranked by relevance, distance and prominence. A business whose Google profile is in order, with an exact address and the right category, shows up in front of an audience that is already in the city and wants to spend money. We wrote about this in depth in our guide on the Google Business Profile for a business in Eilat.
Hotel stays and occupancy by quarter
Between January and August 2025 Eilat hotels recorded about 4.8 million stays according to the CBS. That is 33.8% of all stays in tourist hotels in Israel in that period. A stay is one person sleeping one night. A city with less than 19% of the rooms produces a third of the stays in the country, and that says something simple. The hotels here are much fuller than the national average.
Room occupancy is the percentage of rooms that were occupied on average over a given period. From January to September 2025 it stood at 67.8% in Eilat versus 52.7% nationwide according to the CBS. A gap of about 15 points. That year was still shaped by the war, with almost no inbound tourism, so the number represents almost only Israelis.
Seasonality shows most clearly when you break the year into quarters. The gap between the strongest and the weakest quarter in 2024 is more than 21 points. 87.9% in July to September versus 66.4% in January to March. Even the weak quarter here is above the 2025 national average mentioned above. This is what makes Eilat a market that works all year, with a clear peak in summer and the holidays.
One more thing worth knowing about the CBS publication. It separates stays by Israelis from stays by tourists from abroad for every locality. In the Eilat of 2024 and 2025 the vast majority of stays are by Israelis. When the tourist column starts to move, that will be the earliest sign that foreign tourism is coming back, before you see it in the street. Here are the four quarters of 2024 according to the CBS.
| Quarter | Months | Room occupancy in Eilat | What happens in the city |
|---|---|---|---|
| Quarter 1 | January to March | 66.4% | Winter. The weakest quarter of the year |
| Quarter 2 | April to June | 82.4% | Passover and the spring holidays. The beach season begins |
| Quarter 3 | July to September | 87.9% | The summer school break. The peak of the year |
| Quarter 4 | October to December | 71.9% | Sukkot at the start of the quarter, then a drop toward winter |
- The source for the quarters: the CBS series of publications on tourist hotels. The CBS publishes a monthly and a quarterly figure, and if you want a number for a specific month you need to open the release itself
- Careful with September 2025: we saw two different numbers for September 2025 occupancy on news sites. So we did not put it on this page until we can quote it directly from the CBS
- The first quarter of 2024: at the start of that year evacuees were still staying in the city's hotels. Part of the occupancy in that quarter does not reflect regular tourism
Eilat hotel industry revenue
Eilat hotel revenue in 2023 totaled 3.216 billion shekels according to the CBS. That is 23% of hotel industry revenue in all of Israel. Same picture again. About a fifth of the rooms in the country and close to a quarter of the revenue.
Two things are worth knowing about this number. First. 2023 is an unusual year, because its last quarter was shaped by the war and part of it was evacuee hosting. Second. This is only the money that passes through the hotels' tills. Restaurants, attractions, water sports, taxis and shops are not counted here. We do not have a solid figure for what a guest spends outside the hotel in Eilat, so we do not write one.
Why this matters to you. The guest's money enters the city through the hotel, but it does not stay only there. On day two of the vacation they search on their phone for what to do and where to eat, and that is the moment when paid advertising on Google aimed at people who are physically in the city meets the demand.
Ramon Airport and the flights
Ramon Airport is the only air gateway to Eilat. According to an annual summary published by the local site Yom Yom BeEilat, about 750 thousand passengers passed through it in 2025, almost all of them on domestic flights and only about 7,500 on international flights. Per the Israel Airports Authority summary. The official passenger traffic figures are published by the Israel Airports Authority, and we will update here when we can quote them directly from it.
The important number is the ratio. Almost all passengers at Ramon fly domestic. Compare the number of passengers in a full year to about 4.8 million hotel stays in just eight months and you understand that most guests do not arrive by plane at all. They come by road. About a four hour drive from the Tel Aviv area.
Why this matters to you. The Israeli who arrives by car plans the vacation at home and then decides on the details on the way and at the hotel. Those are two different moments and two different chances to show up in front of them. Before the trip, in a search from the computer at home. After arrival, in a search from the phone. How to build a campaign that targets each of those moments without burning budget is laid out in our guide Google Ads for a small business.
Inbound tourism before and after October 2023
Since October 2023 international flights to Eilat stopped. Until the war, European carriers, including low cost airlines, landed at Ramon in the winter season and brought tourists to the city precisely in the weak months. When the war broke out those routes stopped. In March 2026 Wizz Air started flying again from Budapest, and that is the first sign of a return.
What this means for a business is that the two worlds that existed before the war shrank into one. Almost all guests today are Israelis. If you were debating whether to invest now in a site in English and Russian, the answer at this stage is Hebrew first, then English. More languages are worth the investment when the numbers show the audience from abroad is back. That is exactly why this page gets updated.
What to follow. Two figures are enough. The number of passengers on international flights at Ramon in the Israel Airports Authority publications, and stays by tourists from abroad in Eilat in the CBS publications. When both rise for a few months in a row, that is the time to add a language to the site and to the Google profile.
Residents, wages and employment
About 57 thousand people live in Eilat according to the CBS for 2023. It is a small city that hosts millions of hotel stays a year, so the ratio of locals to visitors is different from most cities in Israel. The city is also far away. About a four hour drive from the Tel Aviv area, so most day to day business happens inside the city, between people who know each other.
According to the State Comptroller report from September 2025, about nine out of every ten businesses in the city depend directly or indirectly on tourism. In plain words, almost every resident you meet works at a hotel, a restaurant, an attraction or for a supplier who serves them. The average wage at the municipal level is published in the CBS local authority profile, and anyone who sells to residents should know it before setting prices.
One more CBS figure. 23.1% of Eilat residents are immigrants who arrived from 1990 onward. Many of them speak Russian, and that is relevant to how you write your ads and to the language on your business profile, even while tourism from abroad is at a low.
Why this matters to you. The local audience is small but it is here all week and all year. A business that serves residents cannot rely on tourists alone in winter, and a business that serves tourists needs the residents as customers and as employees. The two audiences search Google differently, so you need to speak to each one separately.
What this means for your business
Every number on this page translates into at least one decision. Here is our translation, figure by figure.
- About 19% of the hotel rooms in Israel: your customer is already here. The only question is whether they find you when they search from their phone. A tidy Google Business Profile and a clear service page on your site are the foundation, and that is the work we do in SEO in Eilat
- 87.9% versus 66.4%: seasonality is a fact, not a glitch. You build the content and the profile in winter so they are in place by summer, and you shift the paid budget by quarter. We built a seasonality and budget calendar for a business in Eilat around this
- 67.8% versus 52.7%: the hotels here are fuller than the national average even in a year with almost no inbound tourism. The domestic market alone fills the hotels to that level, so there is someone to work with even without tourists from abroad
- About 4.8 million stays in eight months: every stay is one evening in which the guest searches for what to do and where to eat. The demand is there. The competition is for their attention in the hour they decide
- About 750 thousand passengers at Ramon, most of them on domestic flights: most guests arrive by road. They plan at home and decide on the details on the spot. You need to show up in both moments
- About 57 thousand residents and most businesses depend on tourism. The local audience is small and concentrated. Every resident is both a worker in the industry and a customer, and in the weak season they are the main customer. Worth a separate page and a separate message for residents
- The stop in international flights since October 2023: Hebrew and English first. More languages when the data shows the audience from abroad is back
Sources and update log
These are the sources behind this page. When you quote a number from here in an article or a business plan, it is better to quote the original source and note the period. That is how we work too.
- The Israel Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS): tourist hotel publications. Monthly and quarterly releases on rooms, stays and occupancy by locality, and an annual publication on industry revenue
- The Israel Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS): the Eilat local authority profile. Population, immigrants and wages
- The State Comptroller: the September 2025 report on the tourism promotion of Eilat, where the figure on tourism dependent businesses appears
- The Israel Airports Authority: passenger traffic data for Ramon Airport. The 2025 summary we brought here was published on the local site Yom Yom BeEilat
- Update log: 18.8.2026 first publication with CBS data through September 2025 and Ramon data for 2025. The next update is planned for the coming quarter with the new CBS releases
Sources and verification
Every figure in this article was checked against two independent sources before publication. The numbers are given as they were published at the source, and their date is noted next to them. Anything we could not verify twice is not written here as fact.
- The Israel Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS). The tourism statistical quarterly, table 24 and table 30. Press releases on stays in tourist hotels, 2024 and 2025. The local authority profile, 2023
- The State Comptroller. The September 2025 report on the tourism promotion and economic development of Eilat
- The Israel Airports Authority. The 2025 passenger summary for Ramon Airport
- The Ministry of Tourism. Hotel room data by locality
This is exactly what we do at SEO in Eilat. If you want us to go over it together for your business, write to us.
Frequently asked questions
There is no single official figure that counts every visitor to the city, because someone who sleeps in a vacation apartment or comes for one day is not counted. The solid figure is hotel stays. About 4.8 million stays from January to August 2025 according to the CBS. In the same releases the CBS also publishes the number of hotel guests, and if you want people rather than nights you will find it there.
67.8% from January to September 2025 according to the CBS, versus 52.7% nationwide. In 2024 occupancy ranged from 66.4% in the first quarter to 87.9% in the third. The number depends heavily on the season, so always ask which period is being discussed.
52 tourist hotels and 10,954 rooms according to the CBS as of September 2025. That is about 19% of the hotel rooms in Israel. Vacation apartments, villas and guest cabins are not included in this count.
Since October 2023 international flights to Ramon stopped, and almost all traffic there is domestic. In March 2026 Wizz Air started flying again from Budapest. Up to date figures on routes and passengers are published by the Israel Airports Authority, and we update here once a quarter.
About 57 thousand residents according to the CBS for 2023. According to the State Comptroller about nine out of every ten businesses in the city depend on tourism, and according to the CBS 23.1% of residents are immigrants who arrived from 1990 onward.
July to September. In that quarter occupancy in 2024 reached 87.9% according to the CBS. After it comes April to June with Passover. The weak quarter is January to March. You do the content and the prep in the weak quarter so you arrive ready for the strong one.
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