– 1,351 exhibition venues, with a total of 40.5 million sqm, serve the industry worldwide
– China leads the way in terms of available venue space, with the USA and Germany making up the top three
– The report provides a global overview, and 21 market profiles, covering all markets with more than 300,000 sqm of total available venue space
Available exhibition space is a key driver in the development of the exhibition industry globally. To provide the industry with up-to-date figures on space capacities, UFI, the Global Association of the Exhibition Industry, today publishes its full report on the World Map of Exhibition Venues.
The report lists the largest venues for all 21 markets whose total capacity exceeds 300,000 sqm of gross indoor exhibition space.
Kai Hattendorf, UFI CEO and Managing Director, says: “This updated World Map displays the space available around the world for organising exhibitions and other face-to-face events. It represents the industry’s most holistic and complete quantitative dataset. It is remarkable to see that global investments into upgrades and expansions have continued throughout the pandemic, and as we enter a more optimistic phase, it is important to highlight the scale of this capacity, which can benefit both the industries served by exhibitions, and the destinations in which they take place.”
This global census covers all exhibition venues with a minimum of 5,000 sqm of gross indoor exhibition space. Regionally, Europe is home to 39% of the world’s total venue capacity, followed by the Asia-Pacific region (32%) and North America (20%).
In terms of size, the number of “mega venues” – those with more than 100,000 sqm of space – continues to grow. This edition of the World Map now counts 73 such venues around the world, accounting for 5% of the total market. More than one-third (35%) of all venues belong to the medium-size segment, offering between 20,000 and 100,000 sqm. While 60% of venues globally have an indoor capacity of between 5,000 and 20,000 sqm.
Europe and the Asia-Pacific present the largest number of venues with more than 100,000 sqm of space – 39 and 23 venues respectively.
The average size of venues in the Asia-Pacific region exceeds that of any other region, a result of the many infrastructure projects in the region, especially in China. China is now home to 25.2% of the world’s venue capacity. The USA currently holds 17.1% of global venue space capacity, while third-placed Germany is home to 7.9%. Along with Italy and France, these five markets account for more than 60% of the total world indoor exhibition space.
The 2022 UFI World Map of Exhibition Venues covers the following markets: Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Poland, Russia, South Korea, Spain, Switzerland, the Netherlands, Turkey, UAE, United Kingdom and the USA.
In line with UFI’s mission to provide vital data to the entire industry, the full World Map of Exhibition Venues report is available, free of charge, on the UFI website at: www.ufi.org/research
