Almost 300,000 tourists booked overnight stays Derry in 2016, according to new figures released yesterday.
The statistics, which were presented to Visit Derry's AGM, show that 2016 was a "record year" for visitors and that the trend is continuing upwards.
And council officials say that, for the first time, every single month so far this year has exceeded 2013 City of Culture numbers for the same period.
Odhran Dunne, General Manager of Visit Derry, said: "The city region welcomed 283,000 overnight visitors, which was an increase of 26% and a visitor spend of £50m in the local economy, an increase of 18% on 2015."
Mr Dunne said the year-on-year growth in overnight visitor numbers pointed strongly towards the continued success of the local tourism industry.
He added: "It was also reported that the forecast for 2017 is that the tourism sector is on track to outperform 2016, with record hotel occupancy achieved for the first nine months of the year.
"This has seen occupancy rates grow from 69% to 73% compared to last year. We have also seen hotel room sales increase by 7% to almost 134,000 for the same period."
More investment
The growing interest from travel trade and tour operators visiting the city has benefited from an evolving festivals and events program, which has attracted international media coverage. The devaluation of sterling has also increased Derry's competitiveness as a tourist destination.
Mr Dunne said: "To continue this upward trend it is important that we increase investment in destination marketing, driving business tourism growth and developing consumer ready products and visitor experiences.
"All of this will attract an increased market share of international visitors to the North West at the same time building a sustainable tourism economy with increasing employment opportunities for the local community.
"Tourism offers one of the key opportunities for growth potential within our local economy and with exciting accommodation developments and visitor experiences due to open in the next few years it will allow us to realise our true potential as a must see tourism destination on the island."
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