Palma tourism officials are openly courting wealthier American travelers as Mallorca grapples with an overtourism backlash from residents. Their pitch: swap out quantity for quality, even as the island logged more than 13 million visitors in the first ten months of 2025, according to the Balearic Islands Statistics Institute.
Pedro Homar, managing director of Palma’s tourism board, told The Wall Street Journal that American travelers are exactly the kind of visitor the island wants more of. His reasoning is straightforward: Americans spend more and cause less trouble than the crowds Mallorca has become known for.
The numbers back him up. American tourists in Spain spent roughly $410 a day in July, compared to $240 for Germans and $260 for British travelers, per the Journal. American visits to Mallorca climbed 60% through June of this year, and airlines including United have added direct service to meet the demand.
“A Different Experience”
Julie Middlebrook-Levin, a luxury travel advisor with Fora, told Fox News Digital that hotels on the island are increasingly building their marketing around American guests.
“I think that Americans [offer] a fresher approach to Mallorca, and I think a lot of the properties are starting to target Americans because possibly they’re spending more money than Europeans and are looking for a different experience than Europeans have in the past,” Middlebrook-Levin said.
She said the American travelers she works with want authenticity over excess: local food, local culture, local pace.
Homar was blunter about the contrast with other European visitors, telling the Journal that British and German tourists’ “main motivation is partying and drinking.”
“Tourism is our way of life,” Homar said. “The change of model is quality over quantity. We need to have fewer tourists who spend more.”
Locals Aren’t Buying It
Not everyone on the island thinks swapping one tourist demographic for another solves anything. Stella Arbona, a 23-year-old bakery worker in Mallorca, told the Journal that the problem isn’t which nationality is filling the streets — it’s that residents are being crowded out entirely.
“They occupy our streets, our homes, our spaces, and often fail to respect the people who are working for them,” Arbona said. “There’s hardly any space left for the locals.”
Middlebrook-Levin said visitors bear some responsibility for easing that friction. “I think that tourists need to be mindful of being a guest in another country,” she said.
Mallorca has had a rough year on the tourism front generally. Viral videos this summer appeared to show tourists targeted by pickpockets near Palma, and officials there, along with neighboring Ibiza and Menorca, were weighing visitor caps and other restrictions as early as April amid mounting local frustration.
