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Crowded summer destinations and their quiet alternatives

Index 2.0 · As of 25/08/2026 · 282 travel regions

Of 265 travel regions with a distinct data basis, 27 are in the most heavily occupied tenth. For 0 of those, an alternative in the same country and the same coastal class exists, with a similar temperature and far lower occupancy. 27 crowded regions have no match — the conditions are strict enough that not every pairing works.

The methodology explains how this is calculated.

  1. 282travel regions

    Travel regions

    all travel regions with a crowding score in the index

  2. 265travel regions

    Starting set

    of those, distinct NUTS 2 bases — regions sharing one carry identical figures and count once

  3. 265travel regions

    Classified

    of those, with a coastal / island / inland classification

  4. 265travel regions

    Complete

    of which with bed occupancy and summer daytime temperature

  5. 27travel regions

    Crowded

    the most heavily occupied tenth — 10% of the population

  6. 0travel regions

    Pairs

    of those, with a matching alternative in the same country and coastal class; 27 have none

  7. 0travel regions

    Shortlist

    the leaders of this list appear in the table, at most 20

Crowded summer destinations and their quiet alternatives

The selection above ran in full and ends at zero. That is a result, not a failure: the conditions are fixed, and right now no travel region meets them. A new data release may change that.

Same coastal class means: a region with sea access is only replaced by another with sea access, an inland region by inland — so the alternative shares not just a number but a similar setting. The 'same country' condition excludes cross-border comparisons because different school-holiday calendars shift the occupancy curves.

The pairing is algorithmic and greedy: each alternative is assigned only once. A different assignment order could produce different pairs. Occupancy figures apply per statistical region — individual places within a region can be busier or quieter than the regional value.

Generated using Copernicus Climate Change Service information 2025.

The Crowd Report names the emptiest weeks of the coming months — for every region, not just this one. Free, unsubscribe any time.

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These numbers may be reused with attribution, always with the version and the data date — without both, a number cannot be checked.

ExampleHolidayHub, crowding index 2.0, as of 25/08/2026

Full methodology