Visitor numbers for Australia increased by 2.2 per cent in December 2015, according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS).
This marks a significant rise and statistics from the ABS dictate that the trend estimate for arrivals is over 11 per cent higher than in the previous year, reports Business Insider Australia.
In general, the main influx of visitors is from the Chinese market, which is showing a 21.9 per cent growth from 2014 to 2015. In terms of actual numbers, this means that 1.02 million people visited Australia from China last year, which is close to closing in on the amount of visitors from New Zealand.
It doesn't look like Chinese visitors will overtake visitors from New Zealand though, as Kiwi travellers increased by 5.5 per cent over the same year-long period to reach a total of 1.31 million people.
There were 7.4 million who visited Australia in total in 2015, which is an improvement of just over eight per cent and is a record amount, despite falling short of estimates predicted by the ABS.
Other countries that were in the top ten to visit Australia last year included the UK, USA, Japan, South Korea and Hong Kong. In general, most visits were accounted for by Asian countries as Malaysia, Singapore and India were also all in the top ten.
Despite the falling value of the Australian dollar, the country's residents continued to holiday overseas too. The ABS recorded that short-term departures increased by 0.6 per cent when compared to the previous year.
Similarly, in December 2015 there was a recorded uplift of 3.6 per cent and the trend estimate also reflects that departures saw a seasonally adjusted rise of 5.7 per cent from 2014.
Speaking on the increase Margy Osmond, CEO of Tourism & Transport Forum Australia, said: "Tourism is a booming industry for Australia and it's one of the key pillars of our future economic success."
She continued: "This is what happens when you invest in the tourism sector - you see a strong uptake in visitor numbers and that means more Australian jobs and more economic activity in our cities and regional communities."
