Majority of the tourists in Pärnu are Finns, Swedes and Russians.

Perona (German: Alt-Pernau, Estonian: Vana-Pärnu), which was founded by the bishop of Ösel–Wiek c. 1251, suffered heavily under pressure of the concurrent town, and was finally destroyed c. 1600. Another town, Embeke (later German: Neu-Pernau, Estonian: Uus-Pärnu) was founded by the Livonian Order, who began building an Ordensburg nearby in 1265. The latter town, then known by the German name of Pernau, was a member of the Hanseatic League and an important ice-free harbor for Livonia. The Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth took control of town between 1560–1617; the Poles and Lithuanians fought the Swedes nearby in 1609. Sweden took control of the town during the 16th-century Livonian War as part of Swedish Livonia, although it was not formally ceded by Poland-Lithuania until the 1660 Treaty of Oliva. Sweden then lost Livonia to the Russian Empire in the 1710 Capitulation of Estonia and Livonia and the 1721 Treaty of Nystad, following the Great Northern War. It belonged to the Imperial Russian Governorate of Livonia until 1917, when it was transferred to the short-lived Autonomous Governorate of Estonia. The city is occasionally referred to as Pyarnu, an incorrect reverse-transliteration from the Russian Пярну.

When someday comes you'll need to get in.

When someday comes you'll need to be able to get around.