DVS user guidance
This guidance provides an overview of the Domestic Visitor Survey, including its background, purpose, research method and important considerations when interpreting the results, along with information on privacy and data security.
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Background
The Domestic Visitor Survey was developed in response to an information gap on domestic visitor behaviours which are seen as important data pillar in the overall tourism data system.
A Domestic Visitor Survey was recommended by the Tourism Data Leadership Group (TDLG) as a priority dataset for New Zealand.
Stakeholder consultation included: Tourism New Zealand, Tourism Industry Aotearoa, Department of Conservation, RTO – Auckland RTO - Wellington NZ, RTO - Rotorua NZ, RTO – Timaru, and RTO – Mackenzie.
Verian (formerly Kantar Public New Zealand) is commissioned for data collection and processing. MBIE is responsible for the analysis and dissemination of survey results.
DVS purpose
The Domestic Visitor Survey (DVS) measures insights into both peak and off-peak domestic tourism (intentions, behaviours, and experiences) in New Zealand. The aim of the data is to help audiences better understand domestic visitors and support informed decision-making for a thriving tourism sector. While MBIE uses this data for its purposes, the primary audience is the wider tourism and hospitality sector, especially Regional Tourism Organisations (RTOs).
2 DVS surveys will be conducted each year - in October (wave 1) and April (wave 2) - with MBIE releasing DVS data every six months. The first data collection point in October captures peak season travel intentions and off-peak season travel behaviours and experiences. The second data collection in April captures off-peak season travel intentions and peak season travel behaviours and experiences. The survey is funded to run for three years, with two waves of data each year.
This report contains topline findings for the benchmark survey conducted in October 2025 (wave 1). Both overnight trips and day trips are covered. It presents New Zealanders’:
- Domestic travel experiences over the last 6 months (from April to October 2025) 1
- Intentions to travel domestically over the next 6 months (from October 2025 to April 2026)
- Decision making processes used for planned travel in the next 6 months.
1 As a small proportion of respondents were surveyed in November, this period included part of November for these respondents.
Research method
The target audience for the Domestic Visitor Survey (DVS) is New Zealanders aged 15 years and over. Interviewing for wave one of the DVS took place between 6 October to 23 November 2025, with the bulk of the fieldwork (87%) carried out in October.
The DVS uses an online panel survey, with demographic quotas on age by gender, region, and ethnicity. The 15-minute questionnaire was cognitively tested and piloted before use in the main fieldwork.
The DVS is weighted in a way that means that the results can be considered representative of the adult New Zealand population. Post fieldwork, data were weighted on age by gender within region, ethnicity, and individual regions to match 2023 Census population characteristics.
The total sample size for this wave of the DVS was 2,581 New Zealanders aged 15 years and over. 2,546 were sourced from online panels and 35 were sourced from a PTW (Push to Web) survey.
The completion rate for the online panel survey was 85%. This is the proportion of people who started the survey that completed the full survey. Only those who completed the full survey are included in the data.
The PTW component targeted respondents in the Gisborne region and sourced respondents from the printed Electoral Rolls for East Coast and Ikaroa-Rāwhiti. 700 letters were sent out on 6 November 2025. Due to timing constraints no reminder postcards were sent. The response rate for the small PTW component was 5%.
The DVS survey carries a maximum margin of error of +/-1.9% (at the 95% confidence level and assuming simple random sampling).
Survey limitations
This survey represents a sample of the target population – New Zealanders aged 15 years and over. As with all sample surveys, there are inherent limitations related to coverage and non-response that cannot be fully corrected. These factors mean that, unlike a Census, the findings may not perfectly reflect the true attitudes or behaviours of the target population.
Weighting the data to align with known population characteristics helps to reduce these biases, but only in relation to the variables used for weighting.
Quality and privacy standards
Verian, as the survey provider, carried out a series of data checks and cleaning before providing the data to MBIE. This included identifying potentially incorrect data eg numerical outliers, which are then manually edited where necessary. Verian noted that data cleaning was only required for a small number of respondents.
On receipt of the data, MBIE carried out its own data checks. This included checking the completeness of the data, and benchmarking Verian’s results against MBIE’s internally generated figures.
This research has been carried out in accordance with the Research Association of New Zealand Code of Practice and Privacy 2023, the ESOMAR code of conduct, and ISO 20252 standards. All survey responses were collected and stored in accordance with data privacy standards. Respondent identities remain anonymous and no personally identifiable information is reported.
Respondents were told that the survey is about trips people take for holiday or leisure reasons in New Zealand.