The Panama Canal crossing has become one of the most popular routes by tourists travelling at cruises to South American and Caribbean destinations.
The report from the International Association of Cruises Lines (Clia) indicates that last year’s route South Africa and Panama Canal was the main destination for South American cruises with approximately 722,000 passengers, an increase of 1.9% as compared with 708,500 passengers registered in 2024.
That segment focused about 64% of all passengers at cruises from the region, far above the Caribbean, that received 239,400 South American passengers.
The report indicates that the average journey linked to South American and Panama Canal routes had a total duration of crossing from 5 to 6 days on average and the average age of passengers was 46 years.
The 80 km of the Panamanian interoceanic track that takes about 8 to 10 hours to cross, represents one of the most important attractions of the cruises within their journey, some with a path from the Pacific to the Atlantic and then to the Caribbean and South Latin American and Pacific countries.
The report also shows that this South American corridor including the Canal greatly outweighed other destinations, such as the Mediterranean with 85,700 passengers, transatlantic cruises and around the world with 34,900 and Northern Europe with 7,300.
No reference was made to the number of passengers arriving or landing in Panama but it was an opportunity for the country to be home port, that is to say port base of other cruises mainly in the pacific.
The cruising industry’s statistics explain that Brazil remained the largest issuing market in South America with 783,800 passengers amounting to about 70% of the regional total.
Argentina followed with 173,000 passengers and an increase of 19.5% and Colombia with 61,500 passengers an increase of 11.8%.
Panamanian tourist operators note that these data reflect a regional database of travellers that represents an opportunity to strengthen connectivity, scales and tourism with Panama.
According to Clia’s data in 2025, a total of 1.11 million South American passengers did an ocean cruise, a figure that represented an increase of 4.2% as compared with 1.07 million passengers registered in 2024.
