Current information about British tourism

Updated May 2025

Finland's position in the market

The UK views Finland as an efficiently run, secure, and environmentally conscious nation. While many British individuals perceive Finland as a chilly and costly Nordic destination, it is renowned for its association with Santa Claus and its dreamy winter landscapes, including the captivating Northern Lights. Finnish Lapland is continually enhancing its appeal and solidifying its status as the preferred choice for Nordic winter holidays. In 2024 around 40% of the British overnights in Finland took place in December and in Lapland and the UK emerged as Finland's second-largest source market, experiencing a noteworthy 7,2% YoY growth.

Apart from Sweden, all the Nordics have either reached the pre-pandemic levels or surpassed the number of overnights. Denmark welcomed the biggest number of overnights out of all the Nordics in 2024 and also experienced the biggest growth. In Denmark, the vast majority of overnights took place in the capital area, which greatly differs from the other Nordics’ profile, where the overnights are more scattered across the country and also in the rural area. The UK overnights in Finland surpassed the pre-pandemic levels and 2024 ended up being the all time record year in terms of the overnights from the UK. However, the growth in overnights was in the winter months (+12% compared to pre-pandemic), and summer was still lacking behind some -3% compared to pre-pandemic year 2019. The summer overnights did still experience good YoY growth (+11%) indicating that the summer recovery is on a right track.

Finland has managed to gain great visibility in UK media. The most important medias, such as The Guardian, Forbes, BBC and Times have featured Finland during 2024 and early 2025. Thanks to the successful Helsinki Happiness Hacks campaign, Finland has been featured multiple times in varied TV channels in UK. The vast majority of Visit Finland’s PR activities are targeted for increasing Finland’s awareness as a year around destination with a special emphasis on summer months. Finland’s ranking as the most happiest country in the world remains as the single most interesting topic for the UK media, followed by themes such as outdoors, wellbeing and culture.

Consumer trends and behavior

Despite the economic pressures and geopolitical uncertainties, travel industry seems to show resilience and consumers’ willingness to invest into holidays remain strong. ABTA’s recent report reveals that travel remains a priority, with 84% of people who travelled 2024 taking more holidays than before, especially young families who continue to lead in frequency. This increase in travel activity highlights a growing consumer confidence that runs counter to broader economic concerns. Factors like inflation and rising costs have not significantly deterred people from planning and making trips. Travel Weekly’s insider report shows a similar trend: even if the economics are weakening in the UK, the consumers are still determined to travel and the travel is expected to experience modest growth in 2025.

When it comes to booking methods, UK travellers rely on a mix of modern technology and traditional options. The most popular method (51% of respondents) is to book directly through airline or hotel websites. However, closely followed behind is to use online travel agencies like Expedia or Booking.com (48%). Mobile apps, such as Airbnb or Hopper, are used by 28%, while slightly less than a quarter of Brits (24%) will use offline travel agents or agencies, according to YouGov.

Europe remains as the most popular destination for the British outbound travel, with traditional sun and beach holidays in destinations such as Spain, France and Italy as well as city-breaks leading the way. However, the rising temperatures has its impact on British travel behaviour and Brits also are now pondering about choosing a cooler destination. 2024 demonstrations against overtourism in many of the Brits’ favourite Mediterranean destinations has left its mark and especially the families with young children are planning their travel outside of the peak seasons, to avoid the crowds, heat and possible restlessness in the destinations. Sustainability plays still an important role, when choosing individual services within destination or assessing the means of travel, but it is no longer considered as a buzzword or a novelty, but somewhat mandatory. The most sustainably conscious Brits choose to travel domestically, and staycations remain popular.

Luxury travel continues to grow in popularity, especially among the younger generations, Gen-Z and Millennials. All-inclusive and package holidays are in demand. BBC 2025 listing of travel trends look very promising for Finland and the Nordics, as four out of the seven trends listed are very well in line with our USPs. These trends are noctourism (nighttime travel experiences, from late-opening museums to bioluminescent beaches to northern lights watching), calmcations (holidays purely focused on creating a sense of tranquillity), off-the-beaten track travel (choosing lesser known destinations to avoid overly crowded areas), and coolcation and off the season safaris. Additionally Nostalgia travel is listed as a rising trend, which we can already see in Finland to some extent, when Millennial parents want to show their small children the magic of Lapland or the Moomin world

Industry update and distribution channels

Most UK travel companies are flourishing thanks to the surge in outbound travel within the UK over the last year. UK companies have had to adapt their businesses to accommodate the change in booking patterns and trends. Companies are investing more in online booking and digital communication. TUI and Trailfinders have opened more high-street shops to meet the demand of their clients wanting face-to-face service.

Travel agents are providing valuable services that online booking cannot, such as detailed advice, navigating complex travel itineraries, and acting as a safety net when issues arise. This is driving more customers, including younger tech-savvy travellers, to use travel agents.

Booking.com, Expedia, and Last Minute are major OTAs in the UK. TripAdvisor, Skyscanner and Travel Supermarket are the top aggregator sites.

Key TOs that are operating in Finland are TUI (including TUI Crystal Ski, and TUI Tours), and Hotelplan (Inghams, Santa’s Lapland brands). Canterbury Travels and Destinology, (both part of Brooklyn Travel group), Artisan Travel Company with brands (Aurora Zone, Activities Abroad), Transun.

Other key companies include Magic of Lapland, Best Served Scandinavia, (Wexas), Discover the World, Arctic Direct, Magnetic North Holidays, ITC Regent Holidays, Exodus, Baltic Travel Company, Nordic Experience, Jules Verne, Trailfinders, Sunvil, Elegant Resorts, Abercrombie and Kent and Audley Travel.

DMCs as well as direct bookings are both in use among UK travel operators. In general, the use of DMCs are more in demand when packaging less established destinations or more complex packages. Demand is especially high for those DMCs that are able to package tailor made FIT tours.

Finnair remains the largest carrier in the UK with six daily flights from London Heathrow, 12 weekly flights direct from Manchester and a daily flight from Edinburgh, and Dublin, which serves those travelling from Northern Ireland. Norwegian flies directly between London Gatwick and Helsinki six times a week.

Finland travel USP's

The single most important USP for Finland in the UK is Santa Claus, Finland's goodwill ambassador, which drives most Lapland family bookings in December. Families traveling to Lapland in December to meet Santa are by far the single biggest British customer group for Finland, totalling some 40% of the overall British overnights in Finland. Other winter activities are of interest and often included in the Santa holiday package. Those include aspects such as husky- and snowmobile safaris, unique accommodations (glass igloos) and reindeer farm visits. Additionally Finland is seen as a ski destination in the UK and the demand for ski products outside the busy December season in Lapland is on the rise. Northern lights remain as a bucket list experience and a key decision driver for Brits, but Finland alone does not own this USP as the same experience is available in destination such as Norway and Iceland.

Sauna is becoming trendy also in the UK and Finland clearly owns the Sauna in the eyes of Brits. Sauna is often incorporated as something somewhat mandatory when visiting Finland and it goes especially well together with the outdoor experiences in nature. Lakeland as a region is seeing more demand and more and more tour operators are packaging Lakeland fly and drive tours for extended summer season. Those tours often include light activities in nature, interesting local culture experiences and charming accommodation completed with the Sauna experience.

Animal watching and photographing is somewhat of a special interest among the Brits, and especially bear-watching tours in Arctic Lakeland are a popular niche in UK. Similar interest can be seen towards Saimaa ringed seals, and such safari experiences could be even more highlighted as a special unique selling point for the Saimaa region.

Helsinki is viewed as a stand-alone city break destination, but also as the gateway to the rest of Finland. Some tour operators are looking to add a Helsinki stopover to their winter Lapland products, creating Helsinki an opportunity to increase their sales during the winter months. Similarly during the summer months Helsinki can benefit from those Brits seeking to experience regions such as Lakeland and Archipelago by offering Helsinki extensions to those tours.

There is an increased demand for outdoor nature-based and adventure travel among UK travellers, and is expected to continue growing. Factors driving this trend include increased interest in active holidays, a focus on sustainability, and a diverse range of outdoor activities available. Businesses and destinations catering to this market can expect to see sturdy growth and interest from UK adventure-seeking tourists.

Luxury travel is still growing, and the key trends among UK luxury travellers, include a focus on unique, immersive, cultural, and sustainable experiences; a priority on wellness and rejuvenation; a desire for personalised and curated offerings; and a willingness to travel for longer duration. Sustainable luxury accommodations, as well as private villas and chalets in secluded locations, are highly appealing to UK luxury travellers. When targeting to this demanding clientele it is essentially important that the service level meets their standards and a special attention needs to be paid on this. Tour operators have reported that currently Finnish supply, outside of Lapland, can often be regarded more as a “premium” rather than “luxury”.

Sustainability is no longer a buzzword but a core business imperative. Consumers are increasingly demanding sustainable travel options and investors are prioritising businesses with strong environmental, social and governance (ESG) credentials.

Future outlook and upcoming season

Travel companies have reported that sales to Finland for the upcoming summer season are looking promising, although summer Finland remains as a niche travel product in the UK.

As Finland’s winter travel is the so-called bread and butter of the UK tour operators and it now recovered well after the covid, the tour operators can finally pick up from where they left with their new product development. Tour operators such as Artisan Travel, Regent Holidays, Exodus and Discover the World have put more emphasis into the snowless season product development and new itineraries in the southern parts of Finland have been launched for the summer season 2025. Fly and drive tours combining Helsinki and Lakeland seem to drive the development for new summer product supply in the UK. The Golden Triangle, Helsinki, Tampere and Turku with its archipelago region seems to interest FITs wanting to experience Helsinki and the “second-cities” sustainably on rails year around. Summer Lapland and the Midnight Sun products spark already some interest, but the strong winter image might play against its success in the short term. Lapland for the outdoor travellers during the autumn foliage, with the chance of seeing Northern lights, seems to be more appealing to at least some of the tour operators.

Both, seat capacity to Finland from the UK during the summer months as well as the flight bookings are still behind the pre-pandemic levels but show very healthy YoY growth. Given the increased seat capacity, and the fact that the summer overnights in 2024 were only 3% behind the pre-pandemic levels, it is very possible that in 2025 the number of registered overnights from the UK surpass the 2019 and travel from the UK can be regarded fully recovered.