American tourists in Italy 2026: three official counts, a Jubilee year and only partial data for this year

One market, three counts

The Bank of Italy's Indagine sul turismo internazionale is the only official count of trips into Italy. It surveys travellers at the border. Its methodology note says the term "viaggiatori" refers to the number of border crossings and is therefore a synonym for trips. One American who visits twice counts twice. The survey also includes same-day visitors, whose number of nights is zero by definition. On that basis the US accounted for 4.1 million trips in 2025, or 4.4% of the 92.2 million trips made by all foreign visitors. Of those US trips, 3.6 million involved at least one night, and the average overnight trip lasted 10.2 nights.

The ISTAT and Eurostat accommodation series counts something else. It records each check-in at a registered establishment. An American who sleeps in Rome, Florence and Venice on one trip generates three arrivals. Stays with friends and family are outside it. Eurostat's database, updated on 12 October 2026, shows 9,552,802 arrivals and 28,781,029 nights by US residents in Italy in 2025. The average registered stay works out at about 3.0 nights per check-in, a figure we derived by dividing nights by arrivals.

The third count comes from the US side. The National Travel and Tourism Office (NTTO), part of the International Trade Administration, runs a survey of US residents leaving by air. Travellers who visit several countries can appear under each one. In 2024 it put Italy second among overseas destinations, with 4.2 million US travellers, behind the UK at 6.0 million and just ahead of France at 4.1 million, out of 53.8 million overseas travellers in total. In the third quarter of 2025 Italy was again second, with about 1.7 million departures against the UK's 2.0 million. NTTO has not published a full-year 2025 figure for Italy.

These numbers should sit side by side and never in one equation. Dividing check-ins by trips, or survey departures by border crossings, mixes populations that differ in scope, mode of travel and residence. The press has merged them before. An October 2025 Italpress report credited "the Ministry" with 23 million US nights and €6.4 billion of US spending in 2024. The first figure matches the ISTAT accommodation series and the second matches the Bank of Italy survey, so one sentence combined two unrelated datasets.

The accommodation series has a second problem. ISTAT's Storie dati release of 17 July 2026 says the 2025 figure also includes nights in private rentals run on a non-business basis. Without them, Italy's 2025 total would be 481 million nights. With them it exceeds 535 million, and the Eurostat database shows 535,463,245. Eurostat's own news item of 4 March 2026 had given Italy 476.9 million nights, close to the narrower basis, which suggests the rentals were added in a later revision. The current Eurostat data carry no break flag. On the published figures, US nights rose 21.2% in 2025. That is not growth on a like-for-like basis. On ISTAT's comparable basis, total nights for all markets rose about 3.2% (481 million against 466.2 million in 2024, our calculation). No US figure without the private rentals has been published, so true US growth in registered nights cannot be computed. We covered the same break in our Italy tourism record watch for 2026, and it also affects the comparison of Italy and Spain by tourism nights.

Shares are more stable than levels because the break affects every market. On the published basis, Americans accounted for 9.35% of foreign nights in 2024 and 9.54% in 2025, and for 11.0% and 10.9% of foreign arrivals (both our calculations). By that measure the US held its place in Italian registered accommodation and did not surge.

2025: more overnight trips, lower spending per night and a Jubilee year

The Bank of Italy figures for 2025 show more overnight trips and modest spending growth. US overnight trips rose 11.8%, from 3.2 million in 2024 to 3.6 million. US spending rose 3.0%, from €6,412 million to €6,605 million. Spending per night fell from €191.1 to €178.1, a drop of 6.8% by our calculation. Converted at annual average exchange rates, that is roughly $206.8 falling to $201.3, about 2.7% lower. The dollar conversion is ours and only illustrative.

The split by purpose is consistent with this. The Bank's Table 6 puts US spending for personal reasons at €6,113 million in 2025, up 8.5%. Holiday spending, a subset of personal reasons, rose only 1.6% to €4,775 million. The difference between the two covers personal travel other than holidays, which takes in visits to family, religious travel, study and health. That residual rose from €936 million in 2024 to €1,338 million in 2025, about 43%. Spending for work and business, again derived as the residual of total minus personal, fell from €778 million to €492 million, about 37%. Both residuals are our arithmetic. The Bank does not publish them as US rows, and the column labels in the Bank's Table 6 were read from the PDF layout; the holiday column is headed "di cui: vacanze".

The Jubilee is a plausible driver. The Bank's report says nearly two-thirds of the growth in foreign spending in 2025 came from visitors who travelled to take part in the Jubilee. It also says the US supplied 17.1% of Jubilee visitors, ahead of Spain at 11.0%. If Jubilee and family trips cost less per night than holiday stays, a shift towards them would push spending per night down without any change in what a given type of traveller pays. The data are consistent with that mix effect. They cannot prove it, because the Bank publishes no US breakdown of Jubilee spending.

The flat trip count has its own explanation. Total US trips stayed at 4.1 million while overnight trips rose, so same-day trips must have fallen. From the rounded published figures, US same-day trips went from about 0.9 million in 2024 to about 0.5 million in 2025. That estimate is derived and carries a margin of about 0.1 million either way. The Bank does not publish a US same-day figure, so the reason for the fall is unknown.

Americans remain the highest-value visitors per trip. Spending of €6,605 million over 4.1 million trips gives about €1,611 per trip, against about €615 for all foreign visitors (both our calculations). The US made 4.4% of foreign trips and accounted for 11.6% of foreign spending. The average US overnight trip of 10.2 nights compares with 6.4 nights for all foreign visitors, 5.3 for the UK and 6.5 for Germany. Of the markets in the table above, only Canadians come close on length of stay, at 9.3 nights in 2025.

The year before looked weaker. In 2024 US overnight trips fell from 3.5 million to 3.2 million and spending slipped from €6,481 million to €6,412 million. That dip produced headlines about fewer Americans in Italy. The 2025 survey shows overnight trips back above the 2023 level, at 3.6 million.

2026: card data, anecdotes and a currency swing

There is no official Italian figure for US visitors in 2026. ISTAT's quarterly releases for 2026 carry no split by nationality. The Bank of Italy's monthly commentaries divide foreign visitors only into EU and non-EU groups. The July 2026 commentary, published on 13 October, put foreign spending in Italy at €8.3 billion, up 6.8% on July 2025, and spending by non-EU visitors up 6.8% in the three months to July, against 4.4% for EU visitors. The two 6.8% figures are different measures. The June commentary gave €6.8 billion, up 4.8%. These figures cover every non-EU market together, so they cannot be read as American.

The closest thing to a US-specific spending figure is commercial. Nexi's tourism spending report, presented at the TTG trade fair in Rimini and reported by AziendaBanca on 15 October 2026, put US card spending in Italy at €2.55 billion for January to August 2026, up 7.3%. That made the US the top origin, ahead of Germany at €2.42 billion (up 10.5%), out of a foreign total of €16.2 billion (up 5%). AziendaBanca describes them as transaction data from Nexi; it does not set out their coverage, and says the hotel component counts only payments made on site, excluding stays prepaid in full online. We could not find or open the Nexi report itself. They are not comparable with the Bank of Italy series, which ranks Germany first on total spending. One possible reason is that Americans pay by card for a larger share of what they spend. The data do not show this directly.

The US exit survey also points up for the first quarter. NTTO counted 601,000 US-resident air departures to Italy in January to March 2026, tied with France, against 562,000 a year earlier. The change of about 6.9% is our calculation from two survey estimates. Total US overseas departures rose 2.6% in the same quarter.

Airport data are weaker evidence. On 28 May 2026 Quotidiano di Sicilia, carrying an askanews report, said Rome Fiumicino handled about 810,000 passengers on US routes in January to April 2026, up 10% on 2025. The figure sits in a paragraph that credits the trade site businessmobility.travel, which it also cites for first-quarter growth on Milan Malpensa's US routes of 29% for arrivals and 9% for departing flights. We could not open businessmobility.travel, and there is no airport-operator or ENAC primary for either figure. Both count passengers in both directions and of any nationality, Italians included, so neither is a count of American visitors. The Local reported new summer 2026 routes, including United from Newark to Bari, Delta from New York JFK to Olbia and from Seattle to Rome, and ITA Airways from Rome to Houston. The transatlantic network is also shifting after the ITA Airways and Lufthansa deal. One property manager, Halldis, told Idealista its US bookings rose 6% in June to August 2026. That is company data from a single firm.

Other evidence points down. At Federalberghi's annual assembly in April 2026, its president Bernabò Bocca said, as reported by Affaritaliani and AGI on 18 April, that hotels were not seeing large cancellations but were seeing a slowdown from foreign markets, above all the American one. He spoke of conflicts and a perception of instability and uncertain connections. He gave no number and did not name a specific war. In an ANSA interview carried by SoldiOnline on 13 October, he said bookings had stopped for about a month, that hotels had suffered somewhat on the North American market in May and June, and that Americans then started booking again, giving what he called an excellent September and October. He again gave no number.

IRPET, Tuscany's regional economic institute, put growth in North American tourism to Tuscany at only 2.5% in the first quarter of 2026, in an estimate it said was still to be confirmed, and wrote that the momentum seemed to be fading. It called this a probable consequence of pressure on US incomes from inflation and of higher airfares after the rise in crude oil prices. That is IRPET's reading for one region. On the US side, NTTO counted 7.9 million US-citizen air departures to all countries in July 2026, down 2.2% on a year earlier, and 8.5 million passengers between the US and Europe in both directions, down 2.6%. There is no Italy row in that monthly series.

The exchange rate moved in two phases. On the ECB reference rates, the euro averaged about $1.170 from January to May 2026 against about $1.081 a year earlier, so it cost Americans about 8.2% more. From June to September it averaged about $1.151 against $1.164, about 1.1% cheaper than a year before. On 29 October 2026 the rate stood at $1.1130. Over January to September as a whole, the euro averaged about 3.9% more in dollars than in 2025. The averages are our calculations from monthly figures. Bocca linked the spring slowdown to conflicts, a perception of instability and uncertain connections, and did not mention the exchange rate. No source links the two.

The US State Department's advisory for Italy is Level 2, exercise increased caution due to terrorism. Deep Arrival, citing Travel + Leisure, reported on 29 September 2026 that it was reissued on 10 September with no change of level; the advisory page says it was reissued after periodic review with minor edits but, as we viewed it on 31 October 2026, shows no date.

Where Americans go in Italy

No national breakdown of US visitors by Italian region was found. The Bank of Italy publishes spending by macro-area only for all foreign visitors combined. In 2025 the Centre took 28.8% of that spending, the North-West 26.2%, the North-East 23.8% and the South and islands 18.2%. Those shares describe every foreign market together, not Americans.

Tuscany is the one region with usable primary data. Toscana Promozione's provisional bulletin for 2025 makes the US the region's first foreign market by arrivals, at 1.3 million, and its second by nights, at 3.9 million behind Germany's 4.6 million. The bulletin gives an average stay of 2.8 days. IRPET's annual report says US nights in Tuscany grew 6.3% in 2025, and that the US made the largest single contribution to the region's 3.8% growth (the report's chart gives 4.1%), at 0.54 percentage points. The Toscana Promozione figures exclude tourist rentals, while IRPET's estimates add an estimate of short-term rentals, so the two Tuscan sources are not on the same basis as each other or as the national Eurostat figure for 2025. The Tuscan and national numbers should not be compared directly. For travellers planning the region, our Tuscany travel guide covers the main bases.

Elsewhere the data run out. The 2025 Rome figures from EBTL, published via Turismo Roma, give city totals without a US row. We found no usable US figure for Veneto, Lombardy, Campania, Puglia or Sicily. A widely repeated claim that Americans make up 10% of Sicily's tourists could not be verified, because the source page was blocked and its date could not be confirmed. The Jubilee figures suggest a large American presence in Rome in 2025, but no published series measures it.

Roots tourism is often cited as a reason for the US market's depth. The Italian foreign ministry has put roots tourism at 6.6 million in 2024, without naming a dataset or giving a US share. The Italpress claim of more than 17 million Americans of Italian origin carries no source. Our analysis of Italian citizenship by descent looks at a related and better documented flow.

Claims that did not hold up

Several claims about Americans in Italy circulate widely and fail when checked. The largest error is a headline. Italiabsolutely reported on 23 October 2025 that US arrivals were up 22% through August 2025. Its own article body gives 1.4 million arrivals and growth of 2.2%, with no source for either. A follow-up on 27 October 2025 was headlined +2.2%. The same article credited NTTO with a forecast of more than 765,000 Americans for September to December 2025, up 9.4%. We found no destination forecasts published by NTTO, so the attribution is unconfirmed.

Some claims were accurate when made and are now out of date. The Italpress report of October 2025 gave 2024 figures that the 2025 data have since replaced, and it mixed two series in one sentence. Fortune Italia reported in January 2025 that Americans made 21% of online hotel bookings for the year and wrote of a "super-dollar". The booking share came from forward bookings at a single vendor, Blastness, and the dollar weakened through 2025, from $1.0354 per euro in January to $1.1732 in September.

Other claims are partly true or unsourced. Il Sole 24 Ore English ran a July 2025 headline about fewer Americans in Italy. The story rested on a 1.1% fall in US spending in 2024, and its own text said US travellers held at the 2023 level of 4.1 million. Overnight trips did fall that year. Focus on Travel News reported in April 2026 that up to 90% of travel agencies saw a decline and that organised tourism was down by as much as 20%, without naming a survey. The Fiumicino growth of 10% counts route passengers in both directions and rests on a trade site, not airport data. A September 2026 report that the advisory was reissued on 10 September could not be confirmed from the advisory page.

What this means for travelers, businesses and analysts

Travelers cannot yet tell from Italian official data whether 2026 brought more Americans to Italy. The commercial signals point up, and the anecdotes point both ways. The euro cost slightly fewer dollars over the summer than a year earlier and less again in October. The advisory has stayed at Level 2. Entry rules are changing for all non-EU visitors, and our guide to EES and ETIAS at Italian borders explains what US passport holders will see. Americans already stay about 10 nights per overnight trip. Our Rome travel guide helps split that time between Rome and the regions.

Tourism businesses and investors have one solid 2026 signal and several soft ones. Card spending by Americans rose 7.3% in January to August in Nexi's transaction data, and first-quarter US departures to Italy rose on NTTO's survey. Against that, hoteliers reported a spring slowdown, Tuscany's North American growth slowed to 2.5% in the first quarter, and US-citizen air departures fell 2.2% in July. In 2025 US growth came in overnight trips and in personal travel other than holidays, a pattern consistent with the Jubilee, while holiday spending rose only 1.6%. If that mix was Jubilee-driven, it may not repeat in 2026.

Journalists and analysts should not describe the 21.2% rise in US registered nights as growth, call the 4.1 million figure people, or attribute the 22% headline or the 90% agency figure to anyone. The finding this article adds is a measurement gap. Three official series count Americans in three different units, the main accommodation series broke its basis in 2025 without a flag, and the only official 2026 figure is one quarter of NTTO survey data.