Like other tourism destinations world over, Lumbini, the holy birthplace of Sakyamuni Buddha and World Heritage Site has also suffered heavily from COVID-19 in 2021. Tourist visitation decreased by 82.04 percent in 2020 because of still wide spreading pandemic in the comparison of 2019. Lumbini had received total of 1,558,326 tourists in 2019 which shrank to 279,927 in 2020. Categorically, 197,252 Nepalese, 37,206 Indian and 45,469 third-country visitors visited Lumbini in 2020 that makes 83.26%, 81.95% and 73.87% decrement respectively in comparison with that of the previous year. 

The year 2021 witnessed increment of domestic tourists and decrement in foreign tourist visitation in Lumbini. The comparison of tourist arrival in Lumbini is presented in the following table.     

The tourist data of Information and Public Relation Section of Lumbini Development Trust shows that 197,252 Nepalese had visited Lumbini in 2020, which hiked by 120.90% totaling 463,963 persons in 2021.
Indian tourists increased by 17.54% in 2021 than in 2020. The number of Indian tourist in Lumbini in 2020 was 37,206 which reached 43,732 in 2021. 

Lumbini received the lowest number of foreign tourists in 2021. The number of Passport Holder Tourists in Lumbini in 2019 was 174015, which decreased to 45469 in 2020 and the number further dropped to the lowest point counting only 1,197 persons in 2021. This is the lowest foreign tourist visitation ever recorded in Lumbini.