Ke­jan Haynes

Lead ed­i­tor-news­gath­er­ing

ke­jan.haynes@guardian.co.tt

Car­ni­val 2026 de­liv­ered high­er ear­ly-sea­son ar­rivals, strong ho­tel per­for­mance and record par­tic­i­pa­tion de­spite a com­pressed cal­en­dar, while av­er­age vis­i­tor spend dipped slight­ly.

For 2026, the Cen­tral Sta­tis­ti­cal Of­fice used pre­lim­i­nary da­ta cov­er­ing Jan­u­ary 1 to Feb­ru­ary 14, while in 2025, the Min­istry of Cul­ture com­piled fig­ures for the 19-day Car­ni­val pe­ri­od from Feb­ru­ary 14 to March 4.” The Car­ni­val pe­ri­od, as clas­si­fied by the Cen­tral Sta­tis­ti­cal Of­fice, is 19 days in­clu­sive of Car­ni­val Mon­day and Tues­day.

Ar­rivals and air­lift

Ac­cord­ing to Tourism Trinidad Ltd, be­tween Jan­u­ary 1 and Feb­ru­ary 14 2026, Trinidad and To­ba­go record­ed 54,441 ar­rivals, a 13 per cent in­crease over 48,197 dur­ing the same pe­ri­od in 2025. Non-na­tion­al ar­rivals rose from 28,162 to 29,651, while res­i­dents abroad de­clined from 12,860 to 11,793.

The Unit­ed States re­mained the largest source mar­ket, fol­lowed by Cana­da and the Unit­ed King­dom. Cruise ar­rivals sup­ple­ment­ed air­lift, with sev­er­al ships dock­ing in Port of Spain and To­ba­go. Tourism Trinidad not­ed that fi­nalised ar­rival and per­for­mance da­ta will be re­viewed and pub­lished as the post-Car­ni­val pe­ri­od con­cludes.

In 2025, the Min­istry of Cul­ture re­port­ed to­tal air ar­rivals of 41,022 over the 19-day Car­ni­val pe­ri­od, with 28,162 non-na­tion­als and 12,860 res­i­dents abroad.

Spend and ho­tel per­for­mance

Av­er­age ex­pen­di­ture per air vis­i­tor in 2025 was $15,336; pre­lim­i­nary 2026 da­ta from Tourism Trinidad shows $15,313, a mar­gin­al de­cline of TT$23. Ho­tels in Port of Spain reached 83.2 per cent oc­cu­pan­cy dur­ing the Car­ni­val peak week­end (Feb­ru­ary 13–14), with av­er­age dai­ly rates climb­ing to US$501.86. Ho­tel rev­enue for Feb­ru­ary 1–15 to­talled US$10.7 mil­lion, sur­pass­ing Jan­u­ary’s US$7 mil­lion.

Gov­ern­ment in­vest­ed $137 mil­lion in Car­ni­val 2026, ac­cord­ing to the da­ta.

“The sta­tis­tics re­leased by Tourism Trinidad Ltd clear­ly show that Car­ni­val 2026 was big­ger, bet­ter and tru­ly a bumper Car­ni­val," Min­is­ter of Cul­ture and Com­mu­ni­ty De­vel­op­ment Michelle Ben­jamin told Guardian Me­dia.

"The in­crease in vis­i­tor ar­rivals, strong ho­tel per­for­mance and over­all eco­nom­ic im­pact con­firm that our cul­ture con­tin­ues to dri­ve re­al growth for Trinidad and To­ba­go. These num­bers re­flect the hard work of our artistes, mas bands, Steel­pan play­ers, de­sign­ers, ven­dors and com­mu­ni­ties who bring this fes­ti­val to life,” she said.

Satyaka­ma Ma­haraj, Min­is­ter of Trade, In­vest­ment and Tourism, not­ed the eco­nom­ic im­pact as well say­ing “Car­ni­val 2026 con­tin­ues to demon­strate the strength of Trinidad and To­ba­go’s tourism prod­uct. Im­pres­sive ar­rivals and record ho­tel rates re­flect grow­ing glob­al de­mand for our cul­tur­al ex­pe­ri­ences and re­in­force tourism’s con­tri­bu­tion to eco­nom­ic di­ver­si­fi­ca­tion and for­eign ex­change gen­er­a­tion.”