S. Korea ranks 12th in global tourism competitiveness index

South Korea ranked 12th overall in a global tourism competitiveness assessment covering 110 countries, with its sustainability ranking climbing seven places and improvements recorded across all five major categories.

The Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism and the Korea Culture and Tourism Institute announced Thursday that South Korea placed 12th among 110 countries in the World Economic Forum's 2025 Travel and Tourism Development Index, up one spot from its 13th-place finish in the 2023 edition.

The WEF has published a national tourism competitiveness index since 2007 and revamped it into the Travel and Tourism Development Index in 2021 by expanding its assessment of tourism sustainability. The latest report recalculated past scores after adjusting raw data and baseline values, which revised South Korea's 2023 ranking from 14th to 13th.

The index is organized into five major categories and 17 subcategories. South Korea improved its ranking in all five categories compared with 2023. The biggest gain came in "tourism sustainability" — which covers the environment, employment, community contribution and tourism demand — rising seven places from 20th to 13th. "Tourism resources," encompassing natural and cultural assets as well as business and educational tourism, climbed two spots to 14th. "Enabling environment," which measures conditions for tourism businesses, rose one place to 18th. "Tourism policy and enabling conditions," a composite of government tourism budget share, air connectivity and passport strength, gained one spot to 47th. "Infrastructure and services," covering physical infrastructure and service quality, also moved up one place to 25th.

Among the 17 subcategories, South Korea improved in 10 compared with 2023. Particularly notable was its first-place finish in "ICT readiness," along with top-10 rankings in "ground and port infrastructure" (9th), "cultural resources" (10th) and "non-leisure resources" (9th).

Of 102 individual indicators, South Korea placed in the top 10 on 27. It ranked first on six: organized violence, access to basic sanitation, access to basic drinking water, hospital bed density, energy efficiency regulation and timeliness of statistical provision — demonstrating strong competitiveness in social and environmental foundations, particularly within the "enabling environment" category. The single largest ranking jump came in the "tourism sustainability" category, where South Korea's score on the seasonality of international tourist arrivals leapt from 33rd to 4th, signaling greater stability in inbound tourism demand.

Policy and cost indicators revealed weaknesses, however. While timeliness of quarterly and monthly statistics and passport power (2nd) scored well, price competitiveness sub-indicators — covering hotels, purchasing power parity, gasoline and short-term rental accommodation — all fell outside the top 50. Tourism's share of government expenditure (76th), the number of air service agreements (62nd) and the hospitality reputation index (65th) also ranked low.

The top-ranked country in each major category was Switzerland (enabling environment; infrastructure and services), Indonesia (tourism policy and enabling conditions), China (tourism resources) and Chile (tourism sustainability). High-income countries showed strength in safety, ICT and transport infrastructure, while other nations held a relative edge in natural resources and price competitiveness.

Kang Jeong-won, director general for tourism policy at the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, said the ministry would use not only the overall ranking but also the detailed category and subcategory results to analyze the strengths and weaknesses of Korean tourism in depth, building on areas of strong competitiveness while addressing those that need improvement.