Cricket, concerts fuel Indian tourist rush to Australia with higher spends, longer stay

australia

India’s travel craze is fuelling Australia's tourism boom and cricket along with concerts are powering the holiday demand.

Indian tourists are spending more and staying longer, combining their trips to attend matches with leisure holidays as well as opting for newer events like watching a rugby match or a concert, Nishant Kashikar, Country Manager – India & Gulf, Tourism Australia, told Moneycontrol.

Bats, beats, and bookings

"Indians are today travelling for all the social, cultural and economic aspects. There were 6,000 Indians who travelled just to watch the Test Matches in Australia last year. There were 15,000 who travelled to watch the ICC World Cup in Australia. Then there were a lot of Indians who travelled to watch concerts whenever they happened. So, that trend is also going to drive the future of travel out of India," he added.

Kashikar noted that sports present an added opportunity as the destination is already in the news. "We utilise that moment to invite people to showcase beyond the event. Sports drive visitation. Indians who travelled for the Border Gavaskar Series recorded an average spend of $7,000 plus. So hopefully we’ll see a similar number for the upcoming series as well."

It is not just cricket. Jennifer Doig, Regional General Manager for South & Southeast Asia, Tourism Australia said that sports like rugby are also catching Indian tourists' fancy.

"We’re seeing sports tourism growing. Athletes participate and bring their families, who extend their trips like for the F1 or signature marathon events like TCS Marathon in Sydney. So, it's like the hook to get them into Australia and then they extend their trip. We are looking at more initiatives around sports. Rugby is coming. In the pipeline, we have the Brisbane Olympics in 2032," she told Moneycontrol during Tourism Australia’s 19th edition of Australia Marketplace India (AMI), its flagship trade initiative.

Tourism boom

Also, Indians taking more holidays with longer stays and not shying away from long-haul destinations is driving Kashikar's expectation of India becoming the third largest market by 2035 with 1.2 million visitors.

India ranked as Australia's fifth-largest inbound tourism market for arrivals for the year ended May 2025 with 4,53,000 visitors from India, up 10 percent. Spending by Indian visitors for the year ended March 2025 was AUD 2.7 billion during this period, a jump of 14 percent compared to 2024.

AUD is the Australian dollar.

"We grew in double digits pre-Covid and we continued that momentum post-Covid as well. Another trend is that Indians are not just travelling, but they are also spending on Australian holidays with a per capita holiday spend of over AUD 7,000. Also, they are not just travelling and spending but they're also dispersing and staying longer. The number of stays by Indians, cumulatively, reached almost 29 million and that was a 21 percent increase as compared to the previous year. The reason we are witnessing this is because Indians are also dispersing. They're not just travelling to three or four cities but are also exploring new states and territories in Australia," he said.

Kashikar pointed out that Indian tourism in Australia is growing faster than India's outbound travel market despite being a long-haul destination. "We have almost tripled our arrivals and spends as compared to the numbers in 2010, up from 1,40,000 tourists in 2010 and $800 million in spends."

While the Indian outbound industry has grown at 7.6 percent during this particular period, arrivals from India to Australia have grown at a rate of 46 percent higher and grown at 11.1 percent, Kashikar added. "We are seeing Australia significantly improving its ranking from being the 20th-largest outbound destination for Indians to become the 10th-biggest outbound destination."

Flying high

Australia tourism is also in talks with airlines to bump up their load factors.

"Now, aviation has become a critical part of our growth story. 25 percent of our traffic today is driven by direct carriers, and the balance 75 percent by one-stop carriers like Singapore, Lao, Malaysia, Thai, Pacific (airlines), AirAsia. There is a significant increase in the aviation capacity with both Qantas (Australian airline) and Air India commencing direct flights. Qantas has a codeshare agreement with IndiGo, so you can fly from any of the top 50 cities in India and utilise the extensive network that IndiGo has,  and then fly in Qantas from either Delhi or Mumbai," Kashikar said.

He added that Qantas has direct flights of around 12 hours and then Air India has direct flights out of Delhi to Sydney and Melbourne which is helping in catering to the demand.

"We also have an aircraft cargo of almost 300 planes to be delivered over the next decade. Both Air India and IndiGo are getting new aircraft. Mumbai and Delhi are getting new airports very soon."

He is also researching for unserved routes. There are almost 13 routes that have the potential to commence travel between India and Australia out of which nine routes will be commenced with immediate effect.

In addition, Australia will get a new airport with Western Sydney Airport expected to open next year.

Over the next 10 years, the size and scale of the Western Sydney Airport will be bigger than Dubai, said Doig.

Strong ties

Kashikar also said that Australia and India are closer than ever before. "There’s an economic cooperation agreement that we signed, there are almost 100,000 students studying in Australia and many Indians who now call Australia home. As a result of that, a very strong friendship exists between the two countries which is at an all-time high."

He further said that India is one of the fastest growing economies of the world and that they will try to grow the output of the tourism market which is expected to triple from 30 million (trips) to almost 90 million (trips) by 2040. "We would all like to get a share of this market."

What's also interesting is that the size of the high-yielding individuals or those Indians earning more than Rs 30 lakh or AUD 55,000 are expected to increase from 56 million in 2020 to almost 170 million by 2030, he said.

"Estimates show that there are almost 12.3 million HYTs (high yielding tourists) in India and that number has increased by 14 percent (in year ended May 2025) as compared to the year ago," he said.