A short history of tourism in the Maldives

Until the early 1970s the Maldives lived from the sea. Dried tuna, coir rope and cowrie shells had been traded across the Indian Ocean for centuries, but almost nobody came for a holiday. There were no banks, few telephones and no regular international flights; messages to Colombo often went by radio.

The country became fully independent in 1965. The wider story of sultans, trade and independence is in our history of the Maldives.

The first runway

Air travel arrived before tourism did. A first runway of steel planking was laid on Hulhulé, the island next to Malé, and the first aircraft landed there in October 1960. The government later replaced it with an asphalt runway, and Hulhulé Airport formally opened on 12 April 1966. That small airstrip is the ancestor of today’s Velana International Airport.

The story usually starts with an Italian travel organiser, George Corbin, who was looking for empty islands where Italians could swim and fish. He made contact through the Maldives embassy in Sri Lanka and reached Malé by cargo ship.

On 16 February 1972 the first group arrived: 22 people from Italy, on a chartered flight, including journalists whose articles helped put the islands on the map. They stayed for 12 days in a few houses and small guesthouses in Malé, led around by local hosts.

On 3 October 1972 the first resort opened on an uninhabited island close to Malé, with 30 rooms. A second resort followed soon after. The pattern that would shape the next 40 years was set: visitors on their own islands, Maldivians on theirs.

Through the 1970s and 1980s the government chose a model that kept tourism and daily island life apart. Each resort took up a whole uninhabited island, leased from the state, with its own staff housing, power, water and jetty. Visitors could make day trips to inhabited islands, but staying overnight on one was not allowed, and hotels outside Malé were not permitted.

It protected the culture and religious life of island communities, since resorts could serve alcohol and allow swimwear out of sight of village life. It also let the state collect lease rents and taxes from a small number of operators, and it suited a country with plenty of empty islands.

Growth and the airport upgrade

Arrivals climbed steadily. In the late 1970s Hulhulé was enlarged with funding from the Abu Dhabi Fund for Development, with land reclamation to lengthen the runway so that bigger jets could land. Long-haul flights followed, and the Maldives became known for diving and honeymoons. The airport was later renamed Velana International Airport.

The rules for the whole industry were brought together in the Maldives Tourism Act (Law No. 2/99) of 1999. It covers how islands are zoned and leased for tourism and how resorts, hotels, guesthouses, tourist vessels, dive centres and travel agencies are licensed. It has been amended many times since.

Seaplanes open up the atolls

In 1993 seaplane flights began from a lagoon beside the airport island. They let resorts open far from Malé without a long boat trip, and helped spread tourism into distant atolls. Seaplanes still fly only in daylight. See seaplanes and domestic flights for how they work today.

On 26 December 2004 the Indian Ocean tsunami struck the Maldives, causing deaths and wide damage to islands, homes and resorts. Several resorts closed for repairs, and arrivals fell sharply in 2005 before bouncing back strongly in 2006. The disaster also sharpened public debate about how exposed low islands are to the sea, which you can read more about in is the Maldives sinking?.

The biggest change for independent travellers came at the end of the 2000s. After the country’s first multi-party elections in 2008, a parliamentary resolution and the policy changes that followed, from around 2009, allowed Maldivians to run guesthouses on inhabited islands.

The aim was to share tourism income more widely, create jobs on the islands and give visitors a more affordable way to see the country. Some people worried about the effect on religious and family life, which is why local island stays come with clear rules:

• no alcohol on inhabited islands,
• swimwear only on designated “bikini beaches”,
• modest dress in the village, and respect for prayer times and Ramadan.

Our local island etiquette guide explains these in practice.

How local island tourism grew

Growth started slowly and took off in the 2010s, helped by cheaper flights, social media and travellers wanting something different from a resort. Islands close to Malé, with frequent speedboats, led the way.

Dhiffushi, on the eastern rim of North Malé Atoll, is one of these islands. Its story is told in Dhiffushi history and island life.

In December 2021 a further rule change (the fourth amendment to the guesthouse regulation) allowed homestay guesthouses in homes where people live, for locally owned businesses.

The COVID-19 pandemic stopped tourism almost completely. The borders were closed to visitors for more than three months in 2020. On 15 July 2020 the Maldives reopened to international tourists, starting with resorts, liveaboards and hotels on uninhabited islands, with guesthouses on local islands following in stages afterwards.

The separate-island model, once criticised for keeping visitors apart, suddenly looked like an advantage, and arrivals recovered quickly.

Recent milestones, as reported from Ministry of Tourism figures:

In 2025 about 22% of visitors, around 500,000 people, stayed in guesthouses on local islands, and about 73% stayed in resorts. As of February 2025 guesthouses operated on about 116 islands across 20 atolls.

The infrastructure has grown with the numbers. Velana International Airport opened a new runway able to take the world’s largest passenger aircraft, and its new Terminal 1 opened on 26 July 2025. Hanimaadhoo International Airport in the far north opened on 9 November 2025. Details for arriving visitors are in our Velana airport guide.

Visitors also pay more directly towards public services: Tourism GST rose to 17% on 1 July 2025, and MIRA collects a per-night green tax.

Several questions will shape the next chapter:

• Spreading the benefits. Local island tourism has brought jobs and income to island families, and councils are now planning how much more each island can take.
• Protecting reefs and beaches. Tourism depends on healthy coral and clean lagoons, so waste, reclamation and climate change are all live issues. See responsible travel in the Maldives.
• Keeping the balance. The two models, resort islands and local islands, now sit side by side. Our guide to local islands vs resorts compares them for travellers.

The best way to see how far tourism has come is to stay on a local island and talk to the people who run it. Start with our where to stay page for Dhiffushi.