At the start of December 2024, Antwerp welcomed a brand new hotel: a Motel One at Oever, in the city centre near St. Anne’s Pedestrian Tunnel (Sint-Annavoetgangerstunnel). And a new Van der Valk Hotel is readying a space near City Park (Stadspark). But the Antwerp Hotel Association believes that too many hotels are being added, because the occupancy rate during weekdays is on the low side. 

The municipal government responded to the concerns. “We are not going to introduce a stop on hotels, but we are going to let the market play out”,  Alderman for Tourism Koen Kennis (N-VA) says to Gazet van Antwerpen.

Some numbers

In 2019, there were 65 hotels in Antwerp with a total of 4,946 rooms, in May of this year there were already 75 with 5,823 rooms. By the way, that’s enough to welcome the Eurovision Song Contest. So if Belgium wins one day…

And that number is still increasing. With the opening of Motel One on the Oever and soon a new four-star hotel by Van der Valk on the Stadspark, there will now be a few dozen more rooms in Antwerp. And then there are also plans to significantly expand the Hilton Hotel on Green Square (Groenplaats). 

A provisional environmental permit is ready for an expansion with 140 rooms. The majority of these will be built on the higher floors of the adjacent Grand Bazar Shopping Center.

Occupancy

That sounds like great news, but the Antwerp Hotel Association (AHA) has a number of reservations about this growth. 

“During the weekends, the hotel rooms are often full. But during weekdays it is different, and it is much more difficult to have sufficient occupancy”, AHA chairman Didier Boehlen says. 

Boehlen is a hotel manager himself. He runs Hotel Rubens on the Main Square (Grote Markt). 

According to the hotel federation, the occupancy of the hotel rooms is currently below seventy percent and that is too little. 

“There is no reason to panic and it is certainly not the case that a good hotel is in danger of going bankrupt. But the occupancy rate must increase in order to be profitable”, Didier Boehlen argues.

Attracting conferences

Koen Kennis is certainly not planning to introduce a hotel stop. That is by no means self-evident, because the spatial implementation plan for parts of the city centremust be adjusted for that. Because that is where most hotels are located. 

“We have, in consultation with the hotel sector, developed a plan to attract more conferences to Antwerp. This will also result in more overnight stays during weekdays. We are not going to introduce a stop on hotels, but we are also not going to actively look for new operators. In that respect, we let the market play out”, Koen Kennis says.

Airbnb

Alderman Kennis concedes to VRT NWS the municipal government is working on stricter checks of short-term rental apartments. “We as a city do want to focus more on is getting Airbnb lodgings under control. We don’t want to let that number explode, so that they don’t take over the hotels. We have to prevent it from becoming a plague.” 

The hotel sector is already satisfied with that. 

“Too little is being done about that now and we think that is unfair competition,” says Didier Boehlen. “It is high time to tackle that. Because of those Airbnbs and the nuisance they sometimes cause, the local population often has a negative attitude towards tourism.”

Tourisms statistics

Based on mobile data, 493,000 overnight stays were registered in Antwerp hotels during the summer of 2024. That is an increase of 6.2% compared to the summer of 2023. 

What is striking is that since the COVID-19 pandemic, the number of visitors from Asia and the United States has been increasing again. And these are tourists who often book one or more overnight stays. The number of American overnight tourists grew by 26% compared to last year. The majority of overnight stays are for international tourists, a trend that became even stronger this summer.

Mainly day trippers

No less than 79% of all overnight tourists come from abroad. Most come from the Netherlands (39%), followed by Germany (15.5%) and the United Kingdom, despite Brexit (8.7%). 

The top five is completed by the USA (7.5%) and tourists from Spain (7.3%). 

However, Antwerp mainly relies on day tourists. Antwerp received 2.7 million day tourists in the summer of 2024, an increase of 3.8% compared to the summer of 2023. Most day visitors came from Belgium itself, especially from the province of Antwerp and cities such as Ghent and Brussels.

Antwerp 2025-2030

• ANTWERP 2025-2030 | City of Antwerp wants more tourists on weekdays, historic trams and it promises to tackle Airbnb overtourism.
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On tourism

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• Spain saw a surge of Belgians visiting in the first quarter of 2024.
• Antwerp number 1 of 40 most exciting cities to visit in 2024.
• Antwerp’s municipal museums welcomed over 1.5 million visitors in 2023.
• CLIMATE CHANGE & TRAVEL | Is Belgium ready to be the Spain and Italy of the future?.
• Condé Nast Traveler praises Antwerp as one of the Best Places to Go in 2024 in Europe.
• Flanders’ art cities residents still proud of their city, but highlight drawbacks of tourism more
• Antwerp hotel industry demands stricter rules and enforcement for Airbnb as business tourism is not recovering.
• ANTWERP | 13.5 million day tourists, 2.6 million overnight stays and less Dutch visitors in 2023.
• ANTWERP | 2022 tourism statistics show recovery towards 2019 numbers.
• City happy with Winter in Antwerp 2022-2023 edition.
• City sees Winter in Antwerp 2023-2024 breaking attendance records.
• Belgians make 4.5 million day trips to Antwerp every year.
• ANTWERP | 2.2 million day tourists and 398K overnight stays in the summer of 2023.
• ANTWERP | 2 million day tourists and 337K overnight stays in the summer of 2022.
• Belgians travelled massively in the first quarter of 2022.
• The Major Flaws of domestic tourism in Belgium.
• Discovering Belgium and the Netherlands in COVID times.
• Will COVID-19 be the End of Business Class?.
• The world of travel and planning after coronavirus COVID-19.