A record number of visits from China to Britain were recorded in the nine months to September 2019, according to new official figures from the British tourist authority.

VisitBritain said there were 321,000 visits from China during the nine-month period, up 8 percent on the same period in 2018. Visitors from China spent 553 million pounds (722.9 million U.S. dollars) during this period, up 11 percent compared with 2018.

New figures released by the Office for National Statistics show it was a record October for inbound tourism spending in Britain. Visitors spent 2.3 billion pounds (3 billion dollars) in Britain in October 2019, the highest ever for the month of October.