Nepal and Bangladesh recorded contrasting tourism results in 2025 as both countries pursued infrastructure investment, quantified growth targets and stronger regional competitiveness.
Nepal, the world’s ultimate high-altitude sanctuary, is quietly wrestling with the weight of its own legendary reputation and the limits of its existing infrastructure. Bangladesh, long viewed primarily as a domestic getaway, continues its steady effort to build an international tourism identity around the Sundarbans, Cox’s Bazar and its wider cultural heritage. Reflecting strong regional ties, Bangladesh emerged as a top five source market for Nepal in 2025. The arrival of 57,545 visitors highlights a significant upward trend, marking a 17.8% increase over 2024 figures. Both governments have set out clear, quantified benchmarks for where their tourism sectors should stand by the end of the decade and the arrival numbers from 2025 offer an early, factual read on where each currently stands against those goals.
The Numbers: A Tale of Two Trajectories
Nepal’s tourism sector welcomed 1,162,365 international visitors in 2025, representing a 1.29% increase over the 1,147,548 arrivals recorded in 2024.Alongside the arrival count, the average length of stay rose to a record 16.34 days, up from 13.3 days in 2024.The September unrest also left the hotel sector with an estimated Rs 25 billion in damages, with the worst-hit properties in Kathmandu and some other places in the country back under repair by year-end.
Bangladesh recorded 585,145 foreign tourist arrivals in 2025, marking an 11% decline from the 660,000 arrivals in 2024. This downturn follows two consecutive years of post-pandemic growth, which saw 529,268 visitors in 2022 and 655,451 in 2023.Bangladesh’s tourism base remains anchored by a large domestic travel market, estimated in the tens of millions of trips annually, which continues to sustain resorts and river-cruise operators independent of international arrival trends.
Table 1: Comparative Tourism Snapshot (2025)
| Indicator | Nepal | Bangladesh |
|---|---|---|
| Total Int’l Arrivals (2025) | 1,162,365 (+1.3% y-o-y) | 585,145 (–11.4% y-o-y) |
| Avg. Length of Stay | 16.34 days (record high) | 5–7 days (est., international) |
| Top Source Market | India (25.2%) | India / Domestic |
| Key Economic Driver | Leisure, Adventure & Pilgrimage | MICE & Domestic Leisure |
| Major Infrastructure | Pokhara/Gautam Buddha International Airport | HSIA Terminal 3 |
International Tourist Arrivals, 2019–2025
Placed side by side, the two countries’ recovery paths since the pre-pandemic peak look different in scale but broadly similar in shape, both hit bottom in 2021, and both have posted uneven, non-linear recoveries since:
| Year | Nepal | Bangladesh |
|---|---|---|
| 2019 | 1,197,191 | 621,131 |
| 2020 | 230,085 | 181,518 |
| 2021 | 150,962 | 135,186 |
| 2022 | 614,869 | 529,268 |
| 2023 | 1,014,882 | 655,451 |
| 2024 | 1,147,548 | 660,000 |
| 2025 | 1,162,365 | 585,145 |
Nepal’s 16th Periodic Plan: The Next Benchmark
Nepal’s 16th Periodic Plan (Fiscal Year 2024/25–2028/29) formally identifies tourism as a major pillar of the national economy and sets out its own quantified targets for the plan period. By FY 2028/29, the Plan aims for 2.5 million annual tourist arrivals, a tourism GDP share of 7%, average daily tourist spending of USD 85, and an average length of stay of 15 days. Measured against these markers, Nepal’s 2025 performance roughly 1.16 million arrivals, a 16.34-day average stay already above the 15-day target, and daily spending well below the USD 85 mark shows a sector that is over-performing on duration of stay but still has considerable distance to cover on both visitor volume and daily spend.
Infrastructure: The Aviation Engine
For both nations, aviation remains the hard bottleneck. Bangladesh is betting heavily on the Japan-backed, roughly USD 2.3 billion Third Terminal at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport (HSIA) in Dhaka, financed substantially through JICA loans. Once operational, it will add an estimated 12–16 million passengers of annual capacity, positioning Dhaka as a regional transit hub. The terminal, however, is a useful lesson in infrastructure patience: construction began in 2019 and after repeated delays the government is now targeting an opening around late 2026 or early 2027 a date worth watching rather than banking on.
Nepal faces a different challenge: activating underutilized assets. While Kathmandu’s Tribhuvan International Airport remains the primary gateway, flydubai’s new daily direct flights between Pokhara and Dubai, launching 23 September 2026, mark a genuine breakthrough, the first scheduled international service to make Pokhara a true international gateway rather than a domestic add-on to Kathmandu, alongside Bhairahawa’s Gautam Buddha International Airport.
Activities and Advantages
Nepal continues to hold a global monopoly on high-altitude adventure, with mountaineering royalties serving as a durable revenue pillar royalty income grew a striking 36% in 2025 to NPR 1.26 billion, led by Everest alone generating around USD 5 million. Pilgrimage too, remained a significant draw: Lumbini welcomed 153692 third country visitors in 2025 (except Indian citizens), the large majority domestic, alongside a genuinely fast-growing international segment foreign arrivals rose 37% in 2025 over 2024, led by Sri Lanka, Thailand and Myanmar.
Bangladesh is countering with conservation-led design. Proposed frameworks for the Sundarbans the world’s largest mangrove forest, include floating jetties and elevated walkways to protect the ecosystem from human footfall while offering a world-class eco-tourism experience. Furthermore, Bangladesh has a massive, untapped opportunity in medical wellness; currently, 450,000 to 800,000 Bangladeshis spend an estimated USD 4 to 5 billion annually on medical treatment abroad, mostly in India, Thailand and Singapore a scale of outbound spending that is itself a notable data point in the region’s wider medical and wellness travel picture.
Conclusion
Nepal and Bangladesh sit at different points on the tourism curve one an established, adventure-and-pilgrimage-led destination recalibrating after a volatile year; the other a smaller, domestically anchored market still building its international identity around the Sundarbans and its coastline. The 2025 numbers reflect that: Nepal posted modest arrival growth alongside a record-long average stay and softer daily spending, while Bangladesh’s arrivals eased back after two years of gains. Both nations have transitioned from passive post-pandemic recovery to strategic, data-driven growth by codifying concrete numeric targets. Nepal through the benchmarks of its 16th Periodic Plan and the promotional push of the Nepal Wellness Year 2027 and Bangladesh through its long-term Tourism Master Plan have established empirical benchmarks. Crucially, these frameworks provide a measurable yardstick that transforms abstract potential into a accountable roadmap for regional competitiveness.