Nepal Tourist Arrivals Hit 91,363 in June 2026 — Up 19.5% and Beating Pre-Pandemic Levels

June is supposed to be our quiet month. The monsoon arrives, the big trails empty out, and most of us in the trekking business catch our breath before autumn. Not this year. The Nepal Tourism Board says 91,363 foreign tourists arrived by air in June 2026 — a 19.5 percent jump on the 76,425 we welcomed in June last year, and comfortably above the 74,883 who came in June 2019, before the pandemic reset everything.

That last comparison is the one that matters to me. For years the honest answer to "has Nepal recovered?" was "almost." A monsoon month beating its 2019 equivalent by 22 percent says the recovery isn't coming — it has arrived, and it is compounding.

Where June's visitors came from

Immigration data shows the SAARC region supplied more than half of all arrivals — 48,254 visitors, or 52.8 percent — with India alone sending 41,809 travellers. China followed with 8,875, continuing the steady rebuild of that market since direct flights resumed and expanded this year.

The Western trekking markets — the US, UK, Australia, Japan and Germany — together contributed more than 15,500 arrivals in a month when almost none of them come to trek. These are city, culture and monsoon-season travellers: Kathmandu's courtyards, Pokhara's lakeside, Lumbini, Chitwan. It is exactly the "beyond the mountains" tourism Nepal has been trying to build for a decade.

Why arrivals are surging

NTB officials point to improved international air connectivity and sustained promotion, and from the ground I would add a third reason: confidence. This year has brought new direct routes — Shenzhen and Guangzhou in China, movement on Qatar capacity, Shree Airlines cleared for Delhi — and every new city pair quietly removes a reason to postpone Nepal. We covered the bigger arrivals picture in our 2026 arrivals-by-country breakdown, and June extends every trend in it.

What this means for trekkers

Every autumn we watch the same pattern: a strong spring and monsoon in the arrivals data, then an October where Namche and Ghorepani lodges are full by mid-afternoon. With arrivals running a fifth ahead of last year, book the Everest Base Camp trek or the Annapurna Base Camp trek early, and check our month-by-month guide if your dates are flexible.

Source: Nepal Tourism Board / Department of Immigration data, reported by myRepublica.

Cover photo: Markus Koljonen (Dilaudid) via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0).