WHO’S COMING · PANAMA CITY
Panama crossed three million international visitors in 2025 — 3,004,266, up 8.2% — with Tocumen handling 2.24 million air arrivals, cruise ports up 11.5%, and a stopover program that converted a record 215,000 transit passengers into staying guests.
The United States remains the largest market, but the mix is diversifying: Colombia is now the top South American source at 308,000+ visitors in 2025, Canada fills the northern winter, and Europeans arrive on the four legacy nonstops. January 2026 set the all-time monthly record at 273,392 arrivals.
The structure is what distinguishes Panama: tourism revenue hit $6.58 billion in 2025 (+9.7%), growing faster than arrivals — longer stays, higher spend, and a deliberate policy of converting the hub’s 15-million-strong transit flow into destination demand.
The Panama Stopover program is the region’s most literal transit-to-tourism machine: layover passengers add up to 15 days in-country at no airfare cost. 215,000 took it in 2025, a record; 250,000 are targeted for 2026. At $2,249 average trip spend, each incremental stopover cohort is worth half a billion dollars of theoretical demand.
Border and cruise flows complete the picture: Paso Canoas on the Costa Rican line added 106,006 visitors (+2.9%), and cruise arrivals reached 344,408 (+11.5%) as the Amador terminal ramps. Panama is a three-gate destination now — air, sea, land — with air dominant and the other two compounding.
The TIO read: Panama’s arrival story is quality-led — spend growing faster than heads, stays lengthening, and the world’s best-organized stopover program printing incremental demand from traffic it already owns. The dependency is Copa’s network health; the upside is European capacity. Either way, the ledger is maturing.
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