Skip to main content
Glite Dictionary
tourist tax

tourist tax

3.4
Local government charges a small fee per night or per stay for people staying in hotels and other tourist accommodation
  • noun
  • Formal
translation icon : tasa turística
  • Every visitor must pay the tourist tax when staying in the resort.

Examples

  • The tourist tax in this region helps improve local attractions.

  • We paid our tourist tax, now we're going to see the falls.

  • We paid our tourist tax at the hotel before exploring the city.

Synonyms

tax
vstourist tax
∞ 1.0

A charge people must pay to the government on income or property

is a local charge on guests in tourist accommodation, not a general government levy
visitor's tax
vstourist tax
  • Formal
5.2

A small tax people who are not local pay when they stay in places like hotels

is applied to guests in tourist accommodation, often per night or per stay

Surface Forms

tourist tax singular
tourist taxes plural

Morphology

tourist + tax

The meaning is a straightforward composition of 'tourist' (a person visiting for enjoyment) and 'tax' (a mandatory charge), indicating a tax applied to tourists; this noun+noun compounding is a regular and predictable English pattern. The concept is cross-linguistically common (e.g., taxe de séjour, tasa turística), so an average B1 learner who knows both constituents would readily infer the meaning.

Etymology

Tourist tax may come from the simple picture of visitors being asked to pay a small fee. Towns or hotels would ask a tourist to leave a little tax 'per night' to 'help pay for local services' like clean streets and signs, so today it means a small charge added to a visitor's stay.