The number of foreign visitors dropped 2.4 percent in January from a year earlier to an estimated 669,000, the Japan National Tourism Organization said.

Visitors from China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore and Malaysia decreased because the Lunar New Year holidays fell in February this year instead of January like last year, the JNTO said Tuesday.

The number of visitors from China plunged 47.6 percent to 72,500, the biggest drop since September, when the territorial dispute over the Senkaku Islands, claimed by China, flared up.