Planning a Trip Abroad? These 8 Countries Aren’t Always Warm to American Tourists, Survey Says

American tourists can get very different reactions in Europe, and a 2025 survey shows why a simple list of “friendly” and “unfriendly” countries does not tell the whole story.

Upgraded Points surveyed more than 2,200 people across 22 European countries. Overall, 27% had a generally negative opinion of American tourists, while 72% remained open to interacting with them.

The results are more complicated when you look at individual countries. Some had higher levels of annoyance, while others had more respondents describing their country as unwelcoming. Those measures are not interchangeable, and they do not predict how every American traveler will be treated.

France

France had the highest share of respondents who described their own country as generally unwelcoming to American tourists, at 15%. That was still a minority, meaning the finding does not show that most people in France reject American visitors.

American travelers had a stronger perception of France’s attitude. In a separate question, 47% of Americans selected France when asked which countries they believed viewed Americans least favorably.

Only 17% of French respondents said the 2024 U.S. presidential election had changed their view of American tourists. France therefore stands out more for the reputation it has among American travelers than for a majority of French respondents saying their country is unwelcoming.

Norway

Norway had 8% of respondents describing the country as generally unwelcoming to American tourists.

The more notable result came from the question about American politics. Forty-four percent of Norwegian respondents said the 2024 U.S. election had affected their view of American travelers, the highest share highlighted for that question.

That figure does not show whether those views became more positive or more negative. It simply indicates that the election had an influence on how respondents viewed American visitors.

Denmark

Denmark appeared across several different measures of sentiment. About 7.5% described the country as generally unwelcoming to American tourists, while 37% had a negative opinion of American tourists and 14.8% reported feeling annoyed by them.

Another 30% said the 2024 U.S. election had changed their view of American visitors.

Taken together, those numbers show why one measurement cannot describe the entire tourist experience. A person can have a negative impression of some visitors without considering their country generally unwelcoming.

Portugal

Portugal stood out for its reported level of annoyance. About 18.8% of respondents said they were annoyed by American tourists, the highest annoyance figure among the countries highlighted.

Approximately 38% also expressed a negative general opinion of American tourists.

Those results indicate that Portugal had notable levels of irritation and negative sentiment in the survey. They do not establish that American visitors are refused a welcome or treated poorly across the country.

Belgium

Belgium offers one of the clearest examples of why negative opinions and unwelcoming attitudes should not be treated as the same thing.

About 18.3% of respondents reported annoyance with American tourists, while approximately 38% held a negative general opinion of them.

Yet only 1.9% described Belgium as generally unwelcoming to American tourists, the lowest share reported for that question. In other words, negative impressions existed alongside a very low level of respondents saying their country itself was unwelcoming.

The Netherlands

Nearly 40% of respondents in the Netherlands expressed a negative opinion of American tourists, the highest negative-opinion share highlighted in the survey.

Another 14.9% reported annoyance, but only 3% described the Netherlands as generally unwelcoming to American tourists.

The contrast is important. A relatively large share of respondents could have a negative impression of certain tourists while still not describing their country as inhospitable to American visitors generally.

Sweden

Sweden recorded a 36.9% share of respondents with a negative general opinion of American tourists.

The country also had a notable result concerning the 2024 U.S. election. Thirty-one percent said the election had affected their view of American travelers.

These figures describe perceptions rather than predicting how an individual American tourist will be treated during a trip. They show that opinions about American visitors can be influenced by more than the travel experience itself.

Ireland

Ireland had the third-highest annoyance level among the countries highlighted, at 17.4%.

But its overall negative-opinion figure was much lower. Only 18.3% expressed a negative general opinion of American tourists, placing Ireland among the countries with lower negative-opinion shares in the survey.

That combination is a useful reminder that finding some tourist behavior annoying does not automatically mean having a broadly negative view of American visitors.

What Europeans Said About American Tourists

Across the European sample, some perceptions appeared repeatedly. Sixty-one percent believed American tourists expect everyone to speak English, while 30% thought they often ignore local customs.

The survey also found positive perceptions. Sixty-four percent associated Americans with friendliness, while 33% considered them overly friendly. Only 12% selected rudeness as a typical trait.

Those numbers help put the country results into perspective. The survey found criticism, but it also found considerable openness to interaction.

The Bigger Picture for American Travelers

The survey does not measure whether American tourists are likely to face harassment, denied service, or an unsafe trip. It measures opinions and perceptions, and those can vary considerably from one country to another.

The strongest counterpoint is that 72% of European respondents remained open to interacting with American tourists, while only 8% expressed reluctance.

So the takeaway is less about finding a country to avoid and more about understanding that attitudes toward American visitors are mixed. A country can have respondents who are annoyed by certain tourist behavior without those same people believing American travelers are unwelcome.