Tourist vs traveller: What’s the difference?

March 22, 2023

Tourist vs traveller: What's the difference? Image (CC0) by Jan Vašek via Pixabay. https://pixabay.com/users/jeshoots-com-264599/
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What is the dif­fer­ence between a tour­ist and a traveller? 

How do the beha­viours and atti­tudes of tour­ists dif­fer from those of trav­el­lers when inter­act­ing with people and places?

Your cor­res­pond­ent put these tour­ist vs trav­el­ler ques­tions to “GT’s” diverse net­work of travel & tour­ism stake­hold­ers — “GT” Insight authors, “GT” Part­ners, and their invit­ees — and invited emailed writ­ten responses of no more than 300 words. 

Click/touch a name to go to their answer:

Pre­vi­ous “GT” Insight Bites:


Different modes and motivations for travel

Saverio Francesco Bertolucci, Administrative Assistant, Alcambarcelona, Spain

Tour­ists and trav­el­lers are not exactly the same. 

I describe the trav­el­ler as a sub­type of tour­ist who is ded­ic­ated to mak­ing journeys. 

Trav­el­lers invest time and money to see many dif­fer­ent des­tin­a­tions using all trans­port means possible. 

Trav­el­lers’ aim is to get an over­view of many dif­fer­ent places, there­fore they do not prop­erly settle down in an area, but rather move quickly from one des­tin­a­tion to anoth­er. The most fam­ous cluster of trav­el­lers is rep­res­en­ted by globetrotters.

In gen­er­al tour­ists’ needs and wants are more pre­ten­tious and their impact on the loc­al eco­nomy can be more powerful. 

Tour­ists often select a spe­cif­ic des­tin­a­tion for the dur­a­tion of a trip, vis­it­ing many cul­tur­al and nat­ur­al her­it­age sites, res­taur­ants, and oth­er attrac­tions. They rarely organ­ise more than one day trip away from that destination.

Dif­fer­ences can be defined also on a char­ac­ter-based ana­lys­is: Trav­el­lers are free spir­its who wish to make a con­nec­tion with their inner selves, while tour­ists look for mes­mer­ising exper­i­ences to increase their know­ledge of a place and/or enjoy its goods and services. 

It is import­ant to note that these are gen­er­al traits. There are always exceptions.

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Tourist vs traveller: Be responsible, regardless

Zohreh Khosravi, content strategist, Iran

Everything hinges on the atti­tude and beha­viour of tour­ists or trav­el­lers in their inter­ac­tion with the host com­munity and the des­tin­a­tion, regard­less of their category.

It is bet­ter to use the term ‘respons­ible tour­ist’ or ‘respons­ible trav­el­ler’ than simply tour­ist or trav­el­ler, because respons­ible people are ulti­mately what any des­tin­a­tion wants to attract. 

For sim­pli­city I’ll refer to tour­ists … respons­ible tourists.

Respons­ible tour­ists place great value on the des­tin­a­tions they vis­it. From the moment they arrive they con­sider them­selves involved in the improve­ment of the des­tin­a­tion and the well-being of its people.

They plan and con­duct their trips in such a way that res­id­ents bene­fit, as well as themselves. 

When meet­ing res­id­ents, respons­ible tour­ists don’t feel sep­ar­ate or super­i­or, but con­sider dif­fer­ences in life­style and cul­ture as learn­ing oppor­tun­it­ies. Respons­ible tour­ists hon­our the loc­al identity. 

Respons­ible tour­ists prefer to stay in sus­tain­able accom­mod­a­tions and simple eco­lodges instead of chain hotels and inter­na­tion­al resorts. 

Rather than eat­ing in chain fast foods and inter­na­tion­al res­taur­ants, respons­ible tour­ists prefer the exper­i­ence of eat­ing in simple, clean, and cosy loc­al cafes; per­haps even observing and par­ti­cip­at­ing in the cook­ing process. 

Sim­il­arly, such a tour­ist does not go to lux­ury and brand stores. 

When buy­ing souven­irs to take home, they look for real products that come from the heart of the loc­al cul­ture; arts and crafts that are actu­ally pro­duced by locals. 

This sort of respect is what sep­ar­ates the respons­ible tour­ist and respons­ible trav­el­ler from simply the tour­ist or the traveller.

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Tourist vs traveller: The differences are narrowing

S Fatemeh Mostafavi Shirazi, visiting scholar, Iran

On Feb­ru­ary 7, I put “What is the dif­fer­ence between a tour­ist and a trav­el­ler” into Google. It returned 69,800,000 res­ults in 0.62 seconds. 

The attempt to dif­fer­en­ti­ate the ‘tour­ist’ from the ‘trav­el­ler’ has a long his­tory. Authors with dif­fer­ent cul­tures, back­grounds, and per­spect­ives have writ­ten about the sim­il­ar­it­ies and dif­fer­ences between tour­ists and travellers. 

It mainly comes down to the pur­pose of travel. 

For example, were many early trav­el­lers in fact “proto-tour­ists”, as Crick described them in 1985?

Gov­ern­ments like to keep track of who is com­ing and going, and why, which makes defin­i­tions import­ant for statistics. 

From that per­spect­ive, in 2008, the Inter­na­tion­al Recom­mend­a­tions for Tour­ism Stat­ist­ics (IRTS) described a trav­el­ler as “someone who moves between dif­fer­ent geo­graph­ic loc­a­tions, for any pur­pose and any duration”. 

A tour­ist? “A vis­it­or (domest­ic, inbound or out­bound) is clas­si­fied as a tour­ist (or overnight vis­it­or) if his/her trip includes an overnight stay, or as a same-day vis­it­or (or excur­sion­ist) otherwise.”

Undoubtedly, it is an ongo­ing debate as authors define tour­ist and trav­el­ler from dif­fer­ent points of view. Some do believe there are dif­fer­ences along­side many sim­il­ar­it­ies, and some do not. 

The dif­fer­ences between these two terms are nar­row­ing in the digit­al age, as the speed and turnover of inform­a­tion and know­ledge is increasing. 

When we move to a dif­fer­ent place (travel), or vis­it attrac­tions, quer­ies come to our mind that we look for answers to. Tech­no­logy offers the oppor­tun­ity to see new places and their attrac­tions and get answers to our quer­ies without travelling. 

But, the human sense of mov­ing (travel) to and through a phys­ic­al des­tin­a­tion is quite dif­fer­ent from the vir­tu­al envir­on­ment. Without a doubt, the vir­tu­al exper­i­ence is not the same as a real exper­i­ence in a phys­ic­al destination.

Ulti­mately, our con­cern is peoples’ move­ment from one phys­ic­al loc­a­tion to another. 

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For some, ‘moral and cultural status’ matters

Jim Butcher, Reader, Canterbury Christ Church University, UK; Tourism’s Horizon; Politics of Tourism

The main dif­fer­ence is that most tour­ists would nev­er worry about such questions. 

Trav­el­lers might. 

For some of the lat­ter, mor­al and cul­tur­al status, expressed through con­spicu­ous con­sump­tion, matters. 

Tour­ists are after a holiday. 

The 18th cen­tury aris­to­cracy sent their off­spring trav­el­ling around Europe; part of their induc­tion into the elite of their day, through the acquis­i­tion of cul­ture and ‘civil­isa­tion’. 

Today travel can play a com­par­able role. 

A gap year teach­ing Eng­lish abroad, or a stint as a volun­teer tour­ist in a Cam­bod­i­an orphan­age, is a right of pas­sage for middle class youth seek­ing entry into the pro­fes­sion­al mana­geri­al class; the new elite of experts, poli­cy­makers, and NGO employ­ees with the author­ity to decide much about oth­ers’ lives.

Tour­ism as we know and love it arrived with indus­tri­al­isa­tion in the 19th cen­tury, and became increas­ingly avail­able to a grow­ing work­ing class. 

Thomas Cook defen­ded ‘travel for the mil­lions’ in 1850s Bri­tain; pho­to­graph­er Har­old Fein­stein cham­pioned the joy­ful human­ity of New York’s teem­ing tour­ists 100 years later; while Black­pool, Coney Island, Rimini, and the Costa Del Sol wel­comed the masses on their hol­i­days at vari­ous stages throughout. 

But an anti-mass sen­ti­ment is ever present. Even today it is expressed through a desire by some to sep­ar­ate their cul­tur­al pur­suits from those of the lower orders. 

To be a trav­el­ler has often been a way of dif­fer­en­ti­at­ing one­self from the mass tour­ist. But travel need not be infused with the snob­bery of those who sig­nal their vir­tues over the sun seek­ing majority. 

Jack Ker­ou­ac, icon of post 1945 travel, wrote in The Dharma Bums

“I saw that my life was a vast glow­ing empty page and I could do any­thing I wanted.”

A worthy pae­an to youth­ful free­dom for our risk-con­scious, reg­u­lated age, for trav­el­lers and tour­ists alike.

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Tourist vs traveller: Is it relevant?

K Michael Haywood, Professor Emeritus, University of Guelph, Canada

I loathe the word ‘tour­ist’. 

It has become a pejor­at­ive term used unfairly to describe a deluge of out­siders (many trav­el­ling or arriv­ing en masse) unsure of their sur­round­ings and, there­fore, will­ing to remain aloof and observe from afar. 

In anoth­er sense, it has become a descriptor reflect­ing neg­at­ively not only on the industry (that can add value to com­munit­ies), but on those of us who, by nature, are curi­ous introverts.

Ref­er­ence to ‘trav­el­ler’ as being a more enlightened and respect­ful jour­ney­er or adven­turer is sim­il­arly misrepresentative. 

We’re all con­stant trav­el­lers, many of us con­tent to be mobile sight­seers, not neces­sar­ily the type of people who are always seek­ing self-ful­fil­ment or cul­tur­al awareness.

Now, it is being said that the age of the post-tour­ist is upon us. To those of us attent­ive to the nuanced evol­u­tion of travel & tour­ism, we know there is noth­ing new here at all. 

Unfor­tu­nately, though, we’re deal­ing with anoth­er equally ambigu­ous char­ac­ter­isa­tion that’s gen­er­at­ing indis­crim­in­ate advocacy for de-growth, itself far from being a trans­form­a­tion­al panacea. 

As a baseline descriptor I’m con­tent with the more benign term, ‘vis­it­or’, know­ing full-well that most des­tin­a­tions these days are dis­cern­ing as to the desired types of vis­it­ors they seek. To this end, demo­graph­ic and psy­cho­graph­ic seg­ment­a­tion has been the norm for dec­ades, as in Canada’s Explorer Quo­tient Pro­files.  

And yet, while I may be an explorer part of the time, I doubt that I fit neatly into any par­tic­u­lar pro­file. Depend­ing on the time and cir­cum­stance, we all travel for mul­tiple motiv­a­tion­al reasons. 

Cer­tainly our desires and inclin­a­tions can be influ­enced through bet­ter and more eth­ic­al psy­cho­lo­gic­al tar­get­ing, but as strangers wel­comed in the midst of those places we decide to vis­it we must remem­ber: We have oblig­a­tions to act and behave responsibly.

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Leave that baggage at home

Peter Richards, Project Manager, SWITCH-Asia TOURLINK, Thailand

I’ve wit­nessed the often judge­ment-laden tour­ist vs trav­el­ler debate for years, and met vis­it­ors in both camps who have some­times been insight­ful and caring, oth­er times incred­ibly selfish.

There may pos­sibly be some use­ful dis­tinc­tions between a ‘tour­ist’ and a ‘trav­el­ler’.

Per­haps a con­scious decision to jour­ney as a ‘trav­el­ler’ rather than as a tour­ist can lead to very dif­fer­ent, more raw, and in some cases rich­er experiences. 

How­ever, when con­sid­er­ing which kinds of vis­it­ors are truly more of a bless­ing or a bur­den to loc­al places and people, I don’t think that these dif­fer­ences are as import­ant as the more fun­da­ment­al dif­fer­ence between being a friendly, polite, and fairly humble vis­it­or; or being an arrog­ant, demand­ing, and highly self-absorbed visitor. 

I would sug­gest that wheth­er one is on a two-week poolside break from crazy career busy­n­ess, or one is lucky enough to be tak­ing a year-long jour­ney of (self) dis­cov­ery, the more that we can leave the bag­gage of our expect­a­tions and rel­at­ive self-import­ance at home — includ­ing over-think­ing the kudos of our travel cre­den­tials — the bet­ter the exper­i­ence is likely to be for everyone.

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Tourist vs traveller? ‘The planet doesn’t care’

Geoffrey Lipman, President & co-founder, SUNx Malta

The plan­et doesn’t care. Cli­mate change will hit tour­ists and trav­el­lers alike. 

It will kill their kids and grandkids if travel & tour­ism doesn’t play its part fully in the glob­al response. And it will hit the poorest first; par­tic­u­larly the least developed coun­tries and small islands vul­ner­able to sea level rise.

Humanity’s very sur­viv­al is at stake.

Our ment­or at SUNx, the late Maurice Strong, called this out in 1972 at the first Earth Sum­mit that he led in Stock­holm; and in the second that he led in Rio 1992; and in the Earth Charter that he launched in 2000 with Mikhael Gorbachev, call­ing for a pact between people and planet.

The IPCC has said that to get to the safe space of Par­is 1.5 by mid-cen­tury, human­ity has to peak green­house gas emis­sions in 2025, cut them in half by 2030, and hit Net Zero by 2050. 

Human­ity includes all people: Tour­ists and trav­el­lers, vis­it­ors and the vis­ited, and all the people in travel & tour­ism who facil­it­ate that.

Please note “peak in 2025”. Our sec­tor’s silence on this is deafening. 

This is what’s behind the concept of Cli­mate Friendly Travel: Our sec­tor respond­ing to the exist­en­tial threat — keep­ing that simple fact at the top of our minds — as we nav­ig­ate through crowding, intensi­fy­ing elec­tron­ic conversations.

It’s why this ques­tion of tour­ists or trav­el­lers reminds me of the Church in the Middle Ages debat­ing “How many angels can you get on the point of a pin?” 

SUNx eXistential
A “GT” Partner

Cor­rect answer: Who cares?

Wheth­er trav­el­ler or tour­ist, we need to help peak emis­sions now. 

Two real questions: 

  1. How do we all keep trav­el­ling and tour­ing, and organ­ising and man­aging travel and tours, while peak­ing emis­sions in 2025?
  2. What is our plan B to save our kids?

We need answers now.

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In Bhutan: A ‘visitor’ when planning, a ‘guest’ upon arrival

Dorji Dhradhul, Director-General, Tourism Council of Bhutan

In Bhutan’s trans­formed tour­ism policy, which came into effect on Septem­ber 23, 2022, we are subtly yet delib­er­ately repla­cing the word ‘tour­ist’ with ‘guest’.

We believe she is a ‘vis­it­or’ when she is plan­ning to vis­it our coun­try. The moment she arrives, the vis­it­or becomes our ‘guest’.

A guest is more per­son­al and bey­ond business. 

And a guest leaves our coun­try as our friend and fam­ily with a renewed wish to return or stay con­nec­ted for life. 

So, I believe the word ‘trav­el­ler’ has no place or space in our tour­ism approach.

This is being influ­enced by our tour­ism policy and prac­tice of “high-value low volume” aptly backed up by the prin­ciple that tour­ism is bey­ond rev­en­ue and receipts in Bhutan.

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Will AI influence behaviours, attitudes?

Steve Noakes, Chair, Binna Burra Lodge, Australia; Founder, Pacific Asia Tourism

I decided to see what Chat­G­PT might say in answer to your ques­tion. It told me:

“… a tour­ist gen­er­ally seeks a more famil­i­ar and com­fort­able exper­i­ence, while a trav­el­ler is more inter­ested in explor­ing and immers­ing them­selves in new cul­tures and experiences.

“How­ever, it’s import­ant to note that these are gen­er­al­isa­tions, and many people may con­sider them­selves both tour­ists and trav­el­lers, depend­ing on the cir­cum­stances of their trip.”

So then I thought about how arti­fi­cial intel­li­gence (AI)- gen­er­ated inform­a­tion might impact on the beha­viours and atti­tudes of a tour­ist or a trav­el­ler and the way in which they inter­act with people and places.

Well, it’s hard to say at this early stage of the new tech­no­logy, so, I thought I’d ask Chat­G­PT to improve this text I have just written.

This is what it told me:

I made a few minor edits to improve the clar­ity and flow of the text:

“I was curi­ous to see what Chat­G­PT would say in response to your ques­tion, and it provided the fol­low­ing explanation:

‘A tour­ist gen­er­ally seeks a more famil­i­ar and com­fort­able exper­i­ence, while a trav­el­ler is more inter­ested in explor­ing and immers­ing them­selves in new cul­tures and exper­i­ences. How­ever, it’s import­ant to note that these are gen­er­al­isa­tions, and many people may con­sider them­selves both tour­ists and trav­el­lers, depend­ing on the cir­cum­stances of their trip.’

“This got me think­ing about how the inform­a­tion gen­er­ated by arti­fi­cial intel­li­gence may influ­ence the beha­viours and atti­tudes of tour­ists and trav­el­lers, as well as the way in which they inter­act with people and places. It’s dif­fi­cult to say at this early stage of the tech­no­logy’s devel­op­ment, but it will be inter­est­ing to observe how AI con­tin­ues to shape the way we travel and exper­i­ence new cultures.”

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‘The designation is temporary, fluid, and, ultimately, flawed’

David Jarratt, Senior Lecturer in Tourism Management, The University of Central Lancashire, UK

I’m not sure that there is an object­ive dif­fer­ence, rather the term ‘trav­el­ler’ refers to how some tour­ists see them­selves and/or the type of exper­i­ences they consume. 

This dis­tinc­tion hints at exclus­iv­ity and can be con­sidered an attempt to set one­self apart from the ‘masses’. 

This is per­haps best summed up in a quote by Water­house (p18):

“I am a trav­el­ler, you are a tour­ist, he is a tripper”

He points out that such dis­tinc­tions, which emerged in the 19th cen­tury, are largely mean­ing­less as trav­el­lers are fig­ments of their own ima­gin­a­tions or, altern­at­ively, they are simply tour­ists with a bet­ter brand image! 

The self-declared Trav­el­ler may seek seem­ingly authen­t­ic cul­tur­al exper­i­ences and describe them­selves as sens­it­ive, dis­cern­ing, adven­tur­ous, or inde­pend­ent; for travel allows us not only to amass cul­tur­al cap­it­al but it can be seen as reflect­ing one’s life­style and per­son­al qual­it­ies (see Munt for more on this). 

So Ego is a sig­ni­fic­ant ele­ment of the tourist/traveller distinction.

To be clear, in my view, if we are using the tour­ism infra­struc­ture — air­lines and hotels for example — then we are tour­ists. How­ever, I do not use that term in a derog­at­ory fash­ion nor do I have a spe­cif­ic group in mind, rather tour­ism reflects the move­ment of people for a mul­ti­tude of dif­fer­ent reas­ons; busi­ness, vis­it­ing fam­ily, pil­grim­ages, sport, edu­ca­tion­al vis­its, and, yes, holidays. 

‘Hol­i­days’ are increas­ingly wide­spread and var­ied, reflect­ing cul­tur­al and per­son­al inclin­a­tions; their vari­ety is a part of their appeal. I myself enjoy cul­tur­al breaks, out­door adven­tures, and beach hol­i­days in equal measure. 

In real­ity, con­sumers often move between dif­fer­ent types of tour­ism products and tour­ist typo­lo­gies. So, even if one does dis­tin­guish between trav­el­lers and tour­ists, then the des­ig­na­tion is tem­por­ary, flu­id, and, ulti­mately, flawed.

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Tours can be ‘creatively recreated’ to be more like travel

Sudipta K Sarkar, Senior Lecturer in Tourism Management, Anglia Ruskin University, UK

A tour­ist can be referred to as a vis­it­or on a struc­tured vis­it­a­tion plan in which key ele­ments like trans­port, accom­mod­a­tion, culin­ary choices, sight­see­ing, and exper­i­ences are pre-arranged and con­sumed with­in a spe­cif­ic time period. 

A trav­el­ler gen­er­ally moves through a des­tin­a­tion in a less struc­tured way in which most of the ele­ments are determ­ined on the spot. 

A tour­ist may look for more ser­vices and exper­i­ences that are (rel­at­ively) famil­i­ar, com­fort­able, and safe. 

For example, Chinese or Indi­an tour­ists — rep­res­ent­ing some of the fast­est-grow­ing out­bound inter­na­tion­al tour­ist mar­kets — often only dine in food out­lets that offer pre­ferred cuisines. 

Apart from hav­ing pop­u­lar sites on top of their buck­et list, tour­ists may also enjoy exper­i­ences that con­nect with them culturally. 

The Xu Zhimo Memori­al Garden at King’s Col­lege in Cam­bridge, UK, is pop­u­lar among Chinese tour­ists, for instance. (Xu Zhimo was an early 20th cen­tury Chinese poet.) 

Sim­il­arly, Indi­an tour­ists often like to vis­it the shoot­ing loc­a­tions of pop­u­lar Bol­ly­wood films, such as those in Switzer­land or London. 

Fur­ther­more, tour­ists’ inter­ac­tion with loc­als is gen­er­ally minimal. 

Many of the above fea­tures have become linked to ‘mass tour­ism’ in recent years.

Con­versely, trav­el­lers are more likely to engage with loc­al exper­i­ences; meet and chat with fel­low pas­sen­gers of loc­al trans­port; spend more time at pop­u­lar and off­beat spots in dif­fer­ent immers­ive ways, includ­ing deep­er engage­ment with com­munit­ies; sleep at inform­al accom­mod­a­tion out­lets; and try unfa­mil­i­ar culin­ary options. 

Tour­ist exper­i­ences can be cre­at­ively recre­ated to be more like trav­el­ler exper­i­ences by provid­ing oppor­tun­it­ies for genu­ine and deep­er inter­ac­tions with loc­al elements. 

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Better to focus on adjectives, not nouns

Ivana Damnjanović, Vice-dean for international cooperation, Singidunum University, Serbia

The words ‘tour­ist’ and ‘trav­el­ler’ might have dif­fer­ent mean­ings mani­fes­ted through dif­fer­ent (even oppos­ing) mind­sets, atti­tudes, and beha­viours, as often stated. 

‘Tour­ist’ car­ries the notion of travel that is pre-pack­aged, and the neg­at­iv­ity of (mass) tour­ism. It might be a per­son who travels to escape, to tread the same crowded paths in a rush to check long lists of must-see places. An ama­teur traveller. 

‘Trav­el­ler’ might denote some­body spon­tan­eous; will­ing to step out of their com­fort zone to immerse in dif­fer­ent cul­tures, to learn, and to see the hid­den and the unseen. Some­body who cares. An exper­i­enced tourist.

Does this mean that all trav­el­lers are caring and responsible? 

Isn’t vis­it­ing a secluded place dan­ger­ous when the place is not will­ing and/or pre­pared to wel­come visitors? 

Aren’t nat­ur­al and cul­tur­al val­ues again turned into resources? 

Con­versely, can’t travel be pre-organ­ised for a group of people who share an interest in doing good, like volun­teer­ing and cit­izen sci­ence, or trav­el­ling inten­tion­ally to trans­form pos­it­ively not only the extern­al world but their inner world as well? 

Offi­cial dic­tion­ar­ies do not recog­nise such differences. 

I’d like to sug­gest a dif­fer­ent perspective:

  • Stop focus­ing on the nouns and the nuances in their mean­ings. In the (travel & tour­ism) world there is already much divi­sion, enti­tle­ment, silo­ing, sep­ar­a­tion, segreg­a­tion, dif­fer­ence-emphas­is … In such a con­text we would fare bet­ter using words to cre­ate unity and part­ner­ship; a ‘we’ that is hol­ist­ic instead of divided.
  • Focus instead on adject­ives that emphas­ise the pos­it­ive power of tour­ists and trav­el­lers; the atti­tudes and beha­viours that are respons­ible, eth­ic­al, sus­tain­able, regen­er­at­ive, mean­ing­ful, trans­form­a­tion­al … The list goes on. 

Let’s worry less about what we call ourselves; more about how we express who we are.

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Distinctions are ‘used to make people feel inferior/superior’

Edwin Magio, Commonwealth Scholar, Leeds Beckett University, UK

Many art­icles have been writ­ten to explain the dis­tinc­tions between tour­ists and trav­el­lers. The major­ity are based on “who is good and who is bad”. This, in my opin­ion, is used to make people feel inferior/superior. 

Many por­tray tour­ists as mis­be­hav­ing or caus­ing problems. 

To behave badly or well is simply a mat­ter of choice, regard­less of wheth­er one is a tour­ist or a traveller.

That being said, it makes no dif­fer­ence wheth­er you’re a tour­ist or a trav­el­ler; as long as you’re a respons­ible trav­el­ler or tour­ist, you’re on the right track. 

A respons­ible trav­el­ler or tour­ist con­siders the con­sequences of their actions and helps to pre­serve loc­al com­munit­ies, cul­tures, eco­nom­ies, envir­on­ment, and wildlife.

The Respons­ible Tour­ist and Trav­el­ler, based on the World Tour­ism Organ­iz­a­tion’s Glob­al Code of Eth­ics for Tour­ism, is a prac­tic­al guide to becom­ing more responsible. 

Instead of focus­ing on dif­fer­ences, our emphas­is should be on encour­aging tour­ists and trav­el­lers to fol­low the guidelines to make travel more reward­ing for every­one, includ­ing the people they meet and the places they visit.

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What matters is a happy experience for all concerned

Ha Phan, Partnership Officer, ASSET‑H&C, Vietnam

I would say: a tour­ist goes on hol­i­day and a trav­el­ler goes travelling. 

Ha Phan
Ha Phan

From my wan­der­lust per­spect­ive, they are quite dis­sim­il­ar in their approaches before their trip, as well as in their beha­viours in the places they visit. 

When I think of tour­ists, I see them going in large groups or fam­il­ies or book­ing via a tour agency. They may be will­ing to enjoy lux­ury accom­mod­a­tions or spend money on high-end services.

Tour­ists love vis­it­ing all the remark­able sights and attrac­tions in a short time. As such, the sched­ule will be tough, with no time to con­nect with loc­al people.

Mean­while, I see trav­el­lers spend­ing more time explor­ing the cul­ture or place or even learn­ing a bit of the lan­guage to con­nect with the loc­als. They are open-minded to new exper­i­ences and in deep­en­ing their under­stand­ing of the destination. 

Trav­el­lers often prefer quiet places, nature, and rich cul­ture like the coun­tryside and are will­ing to stay in homestays and try loc­al specialties. 

Trav­el­ler trips might be longer than tour­ist itin­er­ar­ies, but they are not neces­sar­ily slower because there is time for unex­pec­ted activities. 

Wheth­er a tour­ist or a trav­el­ler, what mat­ters is that their exper­i­ence is a happy one for all concerned. 

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A “GT” Partner

In case a tour­ist or a trav­el­ler to South­east Asia is inter­ested in adding social impact to their trips, ASSET‑H&C mem­bers wel­come all at their hotels, res­taur­ants, cof­fee shops, baker­ies, and spas. 

ASSET‑H&C mem­ber schools provide high-qual­ity voca­tion­al train­ing to equip stu­dents with pro­fes­sion­al prac­tices and soft skills for their suc­cess­ful integ­ra­tion into the hos­pit­al­ity and tour­ism industry, be it in a 5‑star resort or their own cof­fee shops.

I hope both tour­ists and trav­el­lers will join hands to con­trib­ute to their des­tin­a­tions’ sus­tain­able development.

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‘It doesn’t matter as long as you’re seeing the world’

Susan Eardly, Founder, Serene Vacations, Sri Lanka

Tour­ist or trav­el­ler, it doesn’t mat­ter as long as you’re see­ing the world!

Take your time, plan your hol­i­day, and find out about the cul­ture and his­tory of the coun­try you are visiting. 

Try new things, meet new people, and look bey­ond to under­stand this amaz­ing world and nature we live in.

Exper­i­ence it all! You may nev­er get anoth­er chance.

The beauty of travel is a per­son­al exper­i­ence. A true explorer will ask ques­tions and seek answers. 

Being a tour­ist or a trav­el­ler is all about attitude.

A trav­el­ler is someone who often travels, while a tour­ist travels for pleas­ure and/or sight­see­ing with a guide.

Trav­el­lers will research and study their des­tin­a­tions before leav­ing. They focus on the cul­ture of the coun­try they are vis­it­ing and con­nect with loc­als to exper­i­ence it.

Many trav­el­lers try to learn the loc­al lan­guage, dress like a loc­al, and use pub­lic trans­port, while sup­port­ing loc­al com­munit­ies by avoid­ing buy­ing souven­irs at tour­ist shops.

What is a travel & tour­ism trend for 2023?

‘Mind, body, and soul’ well­ness will go to the next level in 2023, with more people seek­ing mind­ful­ness get­aways. Many people want to find peace at a silent retreat and/or are keen to go on a break that focuses on men­tal health.

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‘The precious baggage of meaning’

Elisa Spampinato, travel writer and community storyteller, Traveller Storyteller

Words carry the pre­cious bag­gage of mean­ing, and although that is use­ful and neces­sary, some­times they can also become dan­ger­ously limiting. 

One of those cases is the clas­sic dis­tinc­tion between the mass tour­ist — the escap­ist who loves spend­ing the entire hol­i­day relax­ing and unplug­ging in their bubble — and the adven­tur­ous trav­el­ler — the open-minded and curi­ous indi­vidu­al that uses travel as a gate­way to new worlds and cultures. 

Accord­ing to the clas­sic pic­ture in our mind, tour­ists seem to look at the hol­i­day as an oppor­tun­ity to com­pletely relax, unplug from their routine lives, and indulge in lux­ury or com­fort that seems denied or unob­tain­able in their daily context. 

The feel­ing of being ‘Kings and Queens for the day’ — exten­ded for the dur­a­tion of the vaca­tion — is usu­ally accom­pan­ied by a self-centred focus where everything revolves around them, sup­por­ted by a tour­ism industry built to serve the customer’s every need.

On the oth­er hand, the trav­el­ler­’s atti­tude seems to be more open, by nature, to any­thing that is unfamiliar.

They are not look­ing for the com­fort to escape ordin­ary dis­com­fort — per­haps because their life is already com­fort­able and fully sat­is­fy­ing — but rather are inter­ested in the fresh exper­i­ences that a new place can offer. 

Embra­cing the spir­it of trav­el­ling as an adven­tur­ous dis­cov­ery, they go on their jour­ney to bring back home new and rich­er memor­ies, new names, faces, and exot­ic stories.

As with all dicho­tom­ies, the two terms exist in their pure form only in the the­ory of books and aca­dem­ic studies.

How­ever, if approached as a tool, these two types can encour­age reflec­tion on our atti­tudes and beha­viours when trav­el­ling, and they can help change our actions, so that tour­ism can become an oppor­tun­ity to grow, con­sciously aware of our impact and the poten­tial bene­fits of our activities.

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Travellers ‘tend to have a more positive impact’ than tourists

ChatGPT Feb 13 Version

The dif­fer­ence between a tour­ist and a trav­el­ler lies in their motiv­a­tions and beha­viours when explor­ing new places.

Remember, in artificial (and human) intelligence: GIGO (garbage in, garbage out). Image: Alexandra Koch (CC0) via Pixabay. https://pixabay.com/illustrations/artificial-intelligence-ai-processor-7692732/
Remem­ber, in arti­fi­cial (and human) intel­li­gence: GIGO (garbage in, garbage out). Image.

A tour­ist is someone who travels for pleas­ure or leis­ure and is motiv­ated by the desire to escape from routine and exper­i­ence some­thing new.

Tour­ists typ­ic­ally fol­low a pre-planned itin­er­ary, stay in hotels or resorts, and engage in activ­it­ies mar­keted towards visitors.

On the oth­er hand, a trav­el­ler is someone who seeks out new exper­i­ences, inter­acts with loc­als, and immerses them­selves in the loc­al culture.

Trav­el­lers tend to explore off the beaten path, stay in loc­al accom­mod­a­tions, and try loc­al food.

Tour­ists and trav­el­lers also dif­fer in their atti­tudes and beha­viours when inter­act­ing with people and places. Tour­ists may be seen as pass­ive observ­ers, while trav­el­lers are more engaged and curious.

Tour­ists tend to stick to their own cul­ture and lan­guage and may demand ser­vices and accom­mod­a­tions that cater to their needs.

Trav­el­lers are more respect­ful of loc­al cus­toms and tra­di­tions, mak­ing an effort to learn some of the loc­al lan­guage and adapt­ing to loc­al norms and behaviours.

Research sug­gests that the atti­tudes and beha­viours of trav­el­lers may have a more pos­it­ive impact on loc­al com­munit­ies and eco­nom­ies than those of tourists.

Trav­el­lers tend to spend more money on loc­al products and ser­vices, while tour­ists may con­trib­ute to the exploit­a­tion of loc­al resources and cultures.

In con­clu­sion, tour­ists and trav­el­lers are two dis­tinct types of trav­el­lers with dif­fer­ent motiv­a­tions, atti­tudes, and behaviours.

Tour­ists seek to escape routine and exper­i­ence some­thing new, while trav­el­lers seek authen­t­ic exper­i­ences and inter­ac­tions with locals.

Trav­el­lers tend to have a more pos­it­ive impact on loc­al com­munit­ies and eco­nom­ies, mak­ing an effort to learn about and respect loc­al cul­tures and customs.

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What do you think? 

Share your own thoughts about the tour­ist vs trav­el­ler debate in a com­ment below. Or write a deep­er “GT” Insight

The “Good Tour­ism” Blog wel­comes diversity of opin­ion and per­spect­ive about travel & tour­ism, because travel & tour­ism is everyone’s business.

“GT” is where free thought travels.

Fea­tured image (top of post): Tour­ist vs trav­el­ler: What’s the dif­fer­ence? Image by Jan Vašek (CC0) via Pixabay.

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