Overseas visitors made a record 30 million trips to the UK last year despite the July 7 bombings in London, it was announced today.

Foreign tourists also set another record by spending £14.2bn in Britain, according to figures released by the Office for National Statistics (ONS).

Although there were 2.2 million more visits last year than in 2004, the impact of the July attacks is revealed in quarterly visitor numbers for July to September. The first quarter of 2005 had a 13% rise in visits compared to the previous year, but the third quarter, from July to September, had only a 4.2% year-on-year rise.

Last year's record total was achieved despite a dip in the number of north American visitors, which was 3% down on 2004 to 4.2 million.

There were 13% fewer visits by Americans in 2005 than in 2000, indicating that American tourist numbers have still not recovered from the September 11 terrorist attacks. However US tourists still spent more in the UK last year than visitors from any other country at £2.4bn.

The statistics also reveal that EU expansion has led to a sizeable increase in visits last year from Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic.

London proved the most popular city for overseas visitors - just over half of all UK visits that included an overnight stop had at least one night in the capital. Outside London, the most popular place to stay was Edinburgh, followed by Manchester and Birmingham.

In 2005, overseas visitors stayed an average of eight nights in the UK and spent an average of £57 per day. Visitors from Pakistan spent most per visit, at £1,697 on average, while visitors from Belgium spent least at £203. Belgians' daily spending, at £72, was higher than the average of £52 for other visitors from Europe, however, but they tended to stay for only three nights on average.

The ONS figures also revealed that UK residents set their own travel record last year by making 66.4m foreign visits - up 4% from 2004. Their spending overseas was also a record, rising 6% to £32.2bn. Spain (13.8 million visits) and France (11.1 million) were the countries most visited by UK residents.

Last year, UK residents made a record 53.6 million visits by air - almost four-fifths of all visits abroad.

The 2005 tourism figures are published by the ONS in its Travel Trends report, which presents the main annual results of the International Passenger Survey.