ELSTAT, the Hellenic Statistical Authority, published Greece's final 2025 accommodation figures on 27 July: 38.2 million arrivals, up 2.8 per cent, and 156.3 million overnight stays, up 2.2 per cent1. International visitors accounted for 73.8 per cent of arrivals and 83.8 per cent of nights, with Germany supplying the largest EU share at 12.7 per cent and the United Kingdom the largest non-EU European share at 16.4 per cent.
Where those guests went reframes Greek short-let policy. The South Aegean and Crete together took 39.5 per cent of arrivals and 49.3 per cent of overnight stays, so two regions carry half the country's tourist nights. Attica, which contains Athens, took 15.3 per cent of arrivals, and Central Macedonia, which contains Thessaloniki, took 12.5 per cent. Those two regions are where every Greek restriction sits.
Athens's central short-let ban was extended into Thessaloniki neighbourhoods in March, and Thessaloniki's first municipal community then froze new registrations in its historic core from 1 July to 31 December. The measures govern roughly a quarter of national arrivals and none of them reaches the islands. Greek freezes work through the AMAD registration number rather than through planning law, which is why a municipal community can impose one within days and why island municipalities with thinner administrative staff have not. The instrument is cheap to enact and cheap to evade, and its map follows administrative capability rather than housing pressure.
The seasonal load makes the mismatch sharper than the annual totals suggest: July to October carried 56.7 per cent of the year's arrivals. A Cycladic municipality running at multiples of its resident population for four months and a Thessaloniki neighbourhood under a registration freeze appear in the same statistical series and face opposite problems. Athens has so far let municipalities act one district at a time, which keeps the political cost local and leaves the concentration where it is.
