VIENNA - A record number of 3.4 million tourists visited Austria in January, up 9.8 percent year-on-year, Statistics Austria revealed in preliminary data on Friday.

Overnight stays, however, decreased by a slight 0.3 percent to about 13.8 million, with the number of foreign guests and Austrian residents staying overnight respectively down 0.8 percent to 11.17 million, and up 1.9 percent to 2.67 million, according to the statistics office.

The drop in overnight stays by international guests was mainly caused by a decline in the number of Russian tourists, who had a habit of coming to Austria to spend Christmas in recent years, down 27 percent year-on-year to 67,500 in January.

There were also fewer visitors from the largest source country Germany staying overnight (down 1.4 percent), as well as from the Netherlands (down 2.7 percent), though there were more visitors from several other countries, such as Poland (up 22.8 percent), Italy (up 11.7 percent), and Switzerland and Liechtenstein (up 4.8 percent).

The average length of stay for visitors was four nights, down from 4.5 nights in January 2014.

The winter season from November to January, as a whole, also saw a record number of 8.3 million visitors, up 5.3 percent year-on-year, with 29 million overnight stays, up 0.6 percent.