Macau’s new yearly visitor arrivals record was made official today, after the Tourist Office had already disclosed preliminary data earlier this month.

Figures released today by the Statistics and Census Service shows that visitor arrivals set a new record of 28 million for the whole of 2011, up by 12.2 percent from 2010, the previous all-time high.

Visitors from the mainland reached 16.1 million, up by 22.2 percent.

Mainland visitors travelling to Macau under the individual visa scheme increased by 20.1 percent from a year earlier to 6.6 million in 2011.

Same-day visitors accounted for 53.8 percent of the total visitors, at 15 million.