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Medical tourism booms with over 1 million visitors spending $1B in 2024

Published: 30 Jul. 2025, 11:46 Updated: 30 Jul. 2025, 17:26

Visitors walk along Myeong-dong Street in Jung District, central Seoul, on July 1. [NEWS1]

More than 1 million foreigners came to Korea last year not for sightseeing, but for skin treatments, surgeries and checkups — spending over 1.4 trillion won ($1 billion) and marking a record-breaking boom in the country’s medical tourism industry.

A total of 1,170,467 individual foreign patients received medical treatment in Korea in 2024, nearly doubling from the previous year — a 93.2 percent increase, according to annual statistics released by the Korea Health Industry Development Institute (KHIDI) on Tuesday.

The total number of treatment visits, including multiple visits by the same patient, reached 1.7 million.

It was the first time since the start of Korea’s foreign patient program in 2009 that the number of individual patients surpassed 1 million in a year. The cumulative number of foreign patients since 2009 now stands at 5.05 million.

Han Dong-woo, director of KHIDI’s International Medical Division, projected further growth.

“Unless there are major disruptions in the second half of the year, the number of foreign patients in 2025 is expected to reach between 1.3 and 1.4 million,” he said.

Data based on overseas credit card payments showed that 919,000 foreign nationals spent a combined 1.4 trillion won at Korean medical service providers last year, averaging about 1.53 million won per person.

By sector, dermatology clinics accounted for the largest share at 585.5 billion won, followed by plastic surgery clinics at 359.4 billion won, department stores at 278.8 billion won, duty-free shops at 188.4 billion won and general restaurants at 183.3 billion won.

Korea also processed over 1.01 million consumption tax refund claims for beauty and plastic surgery procedures in 2024, totaling 95.5 billion won.

KHIDI said that these figures are conservative estimates based on Korean credit card company data.

"Actual expenditures may be significantly higher when including payments made through [Chinese] platforms such as Alipay and UnionPay or in cash — especially given that approximately 260,000 Chinese patients visited Korea last year," KHIDI said.

The Korea Institute for Industrial Economics and Trade estimated that total spending by foreign patients and their companions in Korea reached 7.5 trillion won in 2024.

The average amount spent per patient on medical tourism was approximately 6.41 million won, with Mongolian patients spending the most at 11.87 million won per person.

Japanese patients made up the largest group by nationality at 441,000, with women accounting for 94 percent and those in their 20s and 30s making up 74 percent of the total.

Patients from China came in at 260,000, the United States at 101,000, Taiwan at 83,000 and Thailand at 38,000.

Despite the suspension of direct flights due to the war in Ukraine, the number of Russian patients rose from around 6,000 in 2021 to 16,000 in 2024.

Translated from the JoongAng Ilbo using generative AI and edited by Korea JoongAng Daily staff.
BY HAN YOUNG-HYE [[email protected]]