British Holidaymakers vote the Costa del Sol and the Costa Blanca in Spain their favourite vacation destinations

Spain dislodges Britain at the top of UK consumers’ holiday plans as the UK travel industry prepares to restart.

Research and data analytics company YouGov launched the Destination Index today showing Spain as the first choice for a holiday among UK adults at this moment, closely followed by the UK, Portugal, France, and Italy.

The Index has tracked UK public perceptions of almost 40 destinations each day in advance of travel’s restart, asking a rolling daily sample of UK adults, ‘When you are next in the market to plan a holiday, which destination are you most likely to visit?’

The results go to produce an Intent metric, producing a top-five ranking over 30 days to the end of June. This shows the rankings changed over the course of June, with the UK only losing the number-one spot to Spain in the past few days as the government announced plans for a quarantine-free Covid travel list of countries.

The proportion intending to travel to Spain rose steadily from June 20, with a sizeable proportion planning a trip to Portugal almost doubling over the same period.

YouGov chief executive Stephan Shakespeare said: “Tourism has taken a battering. We can help by putting daily data in the hands of marketers as the industry tries to bounce back.”