MACAO, Feb. 22 (Xinhua) -- Macao welcomed over 960,000 visitor arrivals (non-resident employees and students excluded) during the Chinese Spring Festival holiday, up by 6.5 pct over the corresponding period of last year, the special administrative region's tourism office said here on Thursday.

Macao Government Tourism Office said during the Spring Festival holiday this year from Feb. 15 to 21, visitors from the Chinese mainland, China's Hong Kong and China's Taiwan went up by 6.9 percent year-on-year to a record of 910,000, which accounted for 94.6 percent of total visitor arrivals.

Among them, 710,000 visitors came from the Chinese mainland, registering an increase of 12.3 percent, the office added.

The number of Hong Kong visitors stood at 170,000 with a decrease of 9.4 percent, whereas visitor arrivals from China's Taiwan region went down by 6.7 percent to nearly 19,000.

On the other hand, international visitor arrivals dropped slightly by 0.3 percent year-on-year to a total of 52,000.

The tourism office also said the surge in visitor arrivals was higher than expected, which can be attributed mainly to different favorable factors such as the diversity of spectacular events and festivals, the newly-inaugurated tourism and entertainment complex, the festive vibe as well as the pleasant weather.