According to travel fare search engine, Cheapflights.co.za, there has been a 22% jump in domestic travel searches in South Africa since 2020.
Cheapflights analysed searches between January 1 and May 31, 2021, for flights with departures between January 1 and December 31 from South African airports. That data was then compared with 2020’s searches in the same time frame.
Based on searches done on Cheapflights since the start of lockdown 2020, these are the local destinations that South Africans are most interested in visiting, ranked in order.
- Cape Town
- Johannesburg
- Durban
- Gqeberha
- George
- East London
- Bloemfontein
- Nelspruit
- Kimberley
- Mthatha
The following are the destinations that had the highest increase in popularity from 2019 to 2021 on Cheapflights.co.za:
- Hoedspruit
- Upington
- Pietermaritzburg
- Richards Bay
- Margate
“We are delighted to see the interest in local travel among South Africans,” says Laure Bornet, gm KAYAK EMEA, which manages Cheapflights. “Moreover, our data shows that prices for domestic flights this year are down by almost one-fourth when compared to pre-COVID times of 2019. Now is the perfect time for exploring closer to home.”
Interestingly, many South Africans are searching for domestic holidays with an average length of four days. This is a decrease from this time last year when people were searching for visits to the same cities for an average of five days.
