# Abruzzo for roots travel: 305 towns

> US travelers visiting family go to Abruzzo 20 times more than holidaymakers. 1,267,222 residents across 305 towns and 10,832 square kilometers of mountain.

URL: https://myitalia.it/roots/in-abruzzo
Last updated: 2026-09-02

American travelers visiting relatives go to Abruzzo 20 times more often than American holidaymakers do, into a region of 1,267,222 residents spread across 305 towns and 10,832 square kilometers.

## The scale that explains the drive

Abruzzo holds 1,267,222 residents on January 1, 2026 across 305 towns and 4 provinces: Chieti 369,059, Pescara 311,563, Teramo 299,835, L'Aquila 286,765.

The land under them measures 10,832 km2, at a density of around 117 people per km2, and that density figure is a calculation rather than a published statistic. Most of the surface is mountain.

Divide 1.27 million people by 305 towns and the average settlement holds a few thousand people at most. That is why a village here is 2 hours from an airport even though the region is small: the distance is vertical.

## 7,176,204 nights, and why nobody writes about this

Abruzzo recorded 7,176,204 overnight stays in 2024, 1.54% of the national total. In a country where five towns take 60% of American nights, that share explains the silence in English about everywhere else.

The people who do come are not on holiday in the statistical sense. In 2025, 442,000 US travelers came to Italy to see relatives or friends, 7.2% of the total, and they stayed 11.9 nights against 8.7 for holidaymakers.

Abruzzo is their second destination by intensity, at 20 times the share it takes from holiday travel. Calabria is first at 25 times.

## The tratturi are the thing to look at

Transhumance entered the UNESCO intangible heritage list in 2019 on a joint nomination by Austria, Greece and Italy, and in 2023 it was extended to ten countries.

In Italy it moved along the tratturi, the wide grass droving roads of the Apennines, and the Tratturo Magno ran from L'Aquila to Foggia with its northern end just outside the Basilica of Collemaggio. Worth stating plainly: the UNESCO record names neither Abruzzo nor the tratturi, and that link comes from the regional source instead.

If your family were shepherds, this is the landscape they worked, and it is still legible on the ground.

## Come in December, not in August

December and January are the peak months for the 442,000 US travelers who come to see relatives, and the thinnest months of the general American calendar. Relatives are at home, the coast is empty and the town is at its real size.

August does the opposite: the villages fill with people who also left, and the offices close.

Citizenship by descent is not covered on this site, and this page is no exception. The rules moved in 2025 and are still being litigated, so ask the Italian consulate for the area where you live and write down the date you asked.

See also [Abruzzo](/regions/abruzzo) and [roots travel](/themes/roots-travel).

## FAQ

### How many towns are there in Abruzzo?

305, across four provinces, holding 1,267,222 residents on the ISTAT estimate for January 1, 2026. Chieti is the largest province with 369,059 people and L'Aquila the smallest with 286,765, though L'Aquila covers the most ground.

### Why do so few tourists go to Abruzzo?

The region took 7,176,204 overnight stays in 2024, 1.54% of the Italian total. That is a rounding error nationally, which is exactly why almost nothing is written in English about the inland towns that people come back to.

### What is there to see between the villages?

The tratturi, the wide grass droving roads of the Apennine transhumance. Transhumance was inscribed on the UNESCO intangible heritage list in 2019 by Austria, Greece and Italy and extended to ten countries in 2023; the Tratturo Magno ran from L'Aquila to Foggia.

### Does this site explain citizenship by descent?

No, by editorial rule. The law changed in 2025 and is still in front of the courts, so the only reliable address is the Italian consulate covering where you live. This page stays on the journey: towns, distances, timetables, seasons.

## Sources

| Fact | Source | Confidence | Valid until |
|---|---|---|---|
| Nel 2025, 442.000 viaggiatori statunitensi sono venuti per parenti e amici (7,2%) fermandosi 11,9 notti contro 8,7; vanno in Calabria 25 volte e in Abruzzo 20 volte piu' del turista in vacanza, e arrivano a dicembre e gennaio. | [Banca d'Italia, Indagine sul turismo internazionale](https://www.bancaditalia.it/statistiche/tematiche/rapporti-estero/turismo-internazionale/) | medium | 2027-07-31 |
| Nel 2024 Abruzzo ha registrato 7.176.204 presenze turistiche. pari al 1.54% del totale nazionale | [Eurostat](https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/api/dissemination/statistics/1.0/data/tour_occ_nin2) | medium | 2027-07-31 |
| L'Abruzzo ha 1.267.222 residenti al 1 gennaio 2026 (stima ISTAT) distribuiti in 305 comuni: la provincia piu' popolosa e' Chieti con 369.059 abitanti, quella dell'Aquila e' la meno popolosa con 286.765. | [ISTAT - Demografia in cifre](https://demo.istat.it/app/?i=POS&l=it); [ISTAT](https://demo.istat.it/data/posas/POSAS_2026_it_Comuni.zip) | high | 2027-06-30 |
| L'Abruzzo si estende su 10.832 km quadrati, con una densita' di circa 117 abitanti per km quadrato al 1 gennaio 2026. | [ISTAT](https://www.istat.it/wp-content/uploads/2026/02/Altimetria_Comuni-al-31_12_2021.xlsx); [doc 2](https://demo.istat.it/data/posas/POSAS_2026_it_Comuni.zip) | medium | 2029-12-31 |
| La transumanza e' iscritta dal 2019 nella Lista rappresentativa del patrimonio culturale immateriale UNESCO come candidatura di Austria, Grecia e Italia, ed e' stata estesa nel 2023 ad altri sette paesi europei: l'Abruzzo e' la regione dei tratturi, le grandi vie erbose della transumanza appenninica. | [UNESCO - Intangible Cultural Heritage](https://ich.unesco.org/en/RL/transhumance-the-seasonal-droving-of-livestock-along-migratory-routes-in-the-mediterranean-and-in-the-alps-01470); [Regione Abruzzo - Dipartimento Turismo](https://www.abruzzoturismo.it/it/destinazioni/basilica-di-collemaggio-laquila) | high | 2099-12-31 |

## Image

https://media.myitalia.it/media/region.abruzzo.1600.jpg
Author: Guido Castelli. License: CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0).
Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Landscape_Pacentro_(AQ).jpg

## Other languages

- it: https://myitalia.it/it/roots/in-abruzzo.md
- es: https://myitalia.it/es/roots/in-abruzzo.md
- fr: https://myitalia.it/fr/roots/in-abruzzo.md
- de: https://myitalia.it/de/roots/in-abruzzo.md