HONOLULU (KHON2) -- Hawaiʻi's Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism released the visitor industry's newest statistics, revealing the islands saw a 5.3% increase in visitors in November 2024 compared to last year. Get Hawaii's latest morning news delivered to your inbox, sign up for News 2 You Officials said more than 770,000 visitors visited the islands in November and spent $1.55 billion, which is up 2% from November 2023. Popular all-you-can-eat McCully restaurant to close in February Statistics added most visitors came from the U.S. West and U.S. East, with 762,662 arriving by plane and 8,278 arriving from out-of-state cruise ships. We are pleased to see the continued recovery in our tourism industry in November 2024. U.S. visitors accounted for 77.1% of the total arrivals by air service during the first 11 months of 2024, 10 percentage points higher than the share of U.S. visitors during the same period in 2019. The strong economic growth in the country contributed to the increased travel demand from other states in the country. James Kunane Tokioka, DBEDT Director Visitors spent an average of 8.43 days enjoying the islands, which is shorter than last year's average of 8.76 days but longer than November 2019's 8.3-day average. The state saw a decrease in visitors from Japan, bringing in 60,684 visitors -- a 4.3% decrease from this time last year. "Year-to-date through November, international visitor arrivals by air service recovered 64.5% of the 2019 level for the same period, while Japanese visitor arrivals recovered 45.1%. With the expectation of moderate economic growth in the Japanese economy and improvement of the exchange rate, we anticipate more Japanese visitors in 2025, but the full market recovery may take a few years," Tokioka added. The number of flights to the islands also increased. Officials said about 4,795 flights hit Maui, Kauai, Oahu and Big Island airports, a 0.6% increase from the 4,768 flights in November 2023. Check out more news from around Hawaii November 2024 marks the fourth consecutive month with year-over-year growth for visitor arrivals and spending.