SARAJEVO, Jan. 12 (Xinhua) -- A total of 573,227 tourists have visited Bosnia and Herzegovina's (BiH's) capital Sarajevo during 2018, recording an 18.8 percent increase year-on-year, Institute for Informatics and Statistics of Canton Sarajevo said Saturday.

When it comes to the structure of total tourist arrivals in Sarajevo, 87.0 percent of arrivals were realized by foreign tourists, according to the institute.

Foreign tourists who visited Sarajevo mostly come from Turkey, Croatia, China, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Slovenia, Saudi Arabia, Germany, Serbia, the United States and Italy.

"The absolute record in 2018 was made by tourists from China, who are third in a number of arrivals and sixth in terms of number of overnight stays. Chinese tourists realized an increase of 118.7 percent in arrivals and 114.5 percent of overnight stays year-on-year," the institute said in a report.

Tourism in BiH is a fast-growing sector, making up an important part of the country's economy. In recent years, BiH has seen stable growth in the number of foreign tourists, showing great potential for the future.

In 2018, a total of 1,189,159 overnight stays was recorded by the institute, recording a 22.9 percent rise year-on-year.

Statistics show that 515,285 tourists stayed at hotels, accounting for 89.9 percent of the total number of tourists, and 1,021,452 overnight stays or 85.9 percent of the total number of overnight stays were realized in hotels.

An increase in the number of new hotels, hotel rooms and beds was also recorded in 2018.

"The number of accommodation objects is 350. The total number of rooms is 6,091, recording an increase of 12.4 percent, and a number of beds is 13,710, an increase of 15.9 percent year-on-year," it said.