US surpasses South Korea as Philippines' top tourist source
The United States has emerged as the Philippine's top foreign visitors, surpassing South Korea.
According to data released by the Department of Tourism, there have been 531,859 travelers from the US who visited the country from January to May.
This was an increase by 7.07% compared to the 496,742 American visitors recorded in 2025.
In contrast, South Korea saw a decline in arrivals, posting 501,789 visitors from January to May. This represented a 9.56% drop from the 554,855 tourists who visited the Philippines during the same period last year.
With this development, Tourism Secretary Dita Angara-Mathay highlighted that they are aiming to foster stronger tourism investment and partnerships with American businesses and stakeholders to sustain the growth.
South Korea has consistently been one of the country's top source of foreign arrivals.
The decline among South Korean visitors comes after the country's embassy previously issued strict travel alerts to its citizens when visiting the Philippines due to security concerns, advising them to limit outdoor activities and avoid high-risk areas.
Other countries that rounded out the top five sources of foreign visitors were Japan at 8.26%, China at 6.84%, and Canada at 6.06%. (with reports from Andrew Ronquillo)
