The Way of Sant James

2016 was a historical year for the Camino de Santiago as a total of 278,041 pilgrims collected their Compostelas. This supposed surpassing for the first time the figure of the Xacobeo 2010 registering an increase of 5.99% as regards the pilgrims who attended the Pilgrim office in 2015.

As regards the origin, the foreign pilgrims supposed more than 55% of the total. Specifically, 153,726 international pilgrims were accounted for in the office of Santiago de Compostela.

The origins were very diverse, with a total of 146 countries, which shows the substantial capacity of the Way as regards attracting visitors from all over the world. After Spain, the country which attracted most pilgrims in 2016 was Italy.

After Italy, the ranking of the 10 main countries with foreign pilgrims were Germany, the United States, Portugal, France, Ireland, the United Kingdom, Korea, Australia and Brazil.

Relevant positions with international pilgrims are also occupied by countries such as Canada which is eleventh in the ranking.

The French Way continues to be the most popular

As regards the ways, the route which continues to be the most popular is the French Way. In total 176,180 pilgrims travelled this route and represented more than 63% of the total of the pilgrims who reached Santiago.

After the French Way, the most travelled Way was the Portuguese with more than 52,000 pilgrims, which represents 18.76% of the total. These two routes are followed by the North Way which has a weight over the total amounting to 6.23%, the Primitive Way with 4.35%, the English Way with 3.49% and the Via de la Plata with 3.26%.