VIDEC咨询公司发布《印度旅游市场机会研究（FY23-FY28）》，估算印度旅游市场2026财年规模达5.972万亿卢比（676亿美元），同比增长7.6%，为三年来首次告别两位数增长。航空板块受印巴冲突、印度航空事故、IndiGo排班危机及西亚战争等扰动冲击最大，国内客运量几乎零增长。替代住宿以30%增速领跑，城际巴士增长15%，酒店增长11%。在线渗透率从2020财年的33%升至42%，OTA在各品类线上市场占比普遍超过80%，MakeMyTrip集团仍以过半份额居首。
澳洲航空忠诚计划宣布与Expedia Group达成战略技术合作，覆盖Qantas Hotels & Holidays与Jetstar Holidays平台的数字预订体验与技术能力。Expedia Group B2B将基于其Composable Agentic Template为澳航打造端到端旅行体验，客户可在单一入口预订酒店与假期套餐、赚取和兑换澳航积分并管理整个行程。升级后的平台计划于2027年上半年上线，建设与整合工作正在进行中。
Expedia Group B2B总裁兼首席商务官Alfonso Paredes表示，CarTrawler收购已于9月1日完成，Tiqets已全面整合，其活动库存已上线Expedia Rapid API，并在英国Travel Agent Affiliate Program小范围测试。Expedia B2B第二季度收入同比增长23%，已连续20个季度实现双位数增长，但利润率因合作方组合与整合成本承压。Paredes称最大风险是失去专注，并强调AI是界面、Expedia B2B是基础设施。
根据联邦WARN通知，Expedia Group将在西雅图总部永久裁员58人，涉及数据科学家、财务经理、高级会计师、高级财务分析师和软件开发工程师等岗位，并计划裁减多名副总裁。裁员预计在2026年11月21日至12月1日之间生效。部分裁员源于或导致业务或岗位的迁移或外包。Expedia Group旗下拥有Expedia、Hotels.com、Vrbo、Travelocity、Orbitz等平台。
Booking Holdings全资推出AI助手Lola，由Kayak联合创始人Steve Hafner与Paul English打造，于周二上线。Lola并非Booking.com内的AI功能，而是定位为OTA本身，目标是在一次对话中把旅客从开放式想法带到完成预订。Hafner直接向CEO Glenn Fogel汇报，并获得“绿地”授权，从零开始写代码和建品牌。团队已开发五个月，约20名员工分布在纽约与马萨诸塞州剑桥。
Vrbo, Expedia Group's vacation rental brand, said it is transitioning hosts and property managers to a flat 12% fee starting October 29. Property managers connected to a property management system currently pay a 5% fee, while hosts not connected to a PMS pay an 8% commission. About 55% of listings globally connect to Vrbo through PMS software, including 51% in the U.S., according to AirDNA. The host note did not address guest fees, which currently sit at 11-14%, but a vacation rental expert familiar with Vrbo's plans said the company intends to drastically reduce them; Vrbo's FAQ said travelers will in most cases still see a service fee.
在2026环球旅讯峰会上，飞猪首席技术官陈烨围绕《Agentic Commerce与AI原生旅行，我们走到了哪一步？》分享观点：当AI Agent替用户搜索、比较、决策甚至完成交易，OTA的流量入口、交易方式与经营方式将随之改变。飞猪已将AI能力嵌入旅行场景，其AI原生应用“飞猪帮帮”覆盖灵感获取、行程规划、预订及出行后服务。陈烨还分享了实时收益管理与营销Agent两个探索案例，后者早期实验中客户获客效率与成本出现2—3倍改善。
9月28日，同程旅行与无锡苏南国际机场集团有限公司战略合作签约仪式在同程旅行苏州总部举行。双方将围绕苏锡两地联动、联合营销、数字化智慧机场建设、航旅产品创新、旅客服务升级、商业提质增效等方向开展深度协同。合作包括搭建联合营销体系、旅客分层分类运营、会员信息轻量化互通、落地“首乘无忧”服务及电子化登机牌权益体系。无锡硕放机场2025年旅客吞吐量达1096万人次。
Tongcheng Travel data shows search interest in short-duration destination small groups rose over 110% year on year for the 2026 Mid-Autumn and National Day holiday. As of September 29, searches for 'half-day tour' and 'one-day tour' keywords on the platform rose 128% year on year, and one-day premium small-group orders grew over 70%. Bookings for 2-3 day short-haul small groups and intercity combo products rose over 65%, with families and group travellers dominating. Short-duration small groups unbundle travel services rather than forcing flight and hotel packages.
Data released by the Guangzhou Municipal Culture, Radio, Television and Tourism Bureau on 27 September shows that during the Mid-Autumn Festival holiday, Guangzhou received over 6.6 million visitors and achieved comprehensive cultural tourism consumption of CNY 4.63 billion. Data from OTA platforms including Tongcheng shows Guangzhou was among the top ten domestic destinations for the holiday. The 31 monitored cultural tourism attractions received over 2.84 million visitors. Guangzhou hosted various Cantonese folk activities and themed events, and the 2026 Guangzhou Super Strawberry Music Festival ran for three consecutive days with over 60,000 attendees.
At Skift Global Forum, Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi confirmed Uber plans to add vacation rental content through its Expedia Group integration, with 80% of its hotel bookings already coming from UberOne members, bypassing Google. Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky committed to launching an AI agent in 2027, calling it the most important product the company has ever built. The discussion also covered AI agents' impact on short-term rental discovery, reviews, and direct booking data.
Cleartrip, the Flipkart-owned online travel platform, announced its entry into holiday packages, bundling flights, hotels, activities and transfers into customizable itineraries. Gaurav Patwari, Chief Business Officer — Air, told Skift that India's overall travel booking market is worth $75 billion-$80 billion, with holidays and packages accounting for about $20 billion. More than 90% of the holiday market remains fragmented, with online penetration even lower. Travelers can start from an expert-curated package and then change hotels, flights, transfers and activities.
Agoda published a feature highlighting six Asian destinations known for their coffee culture: Da Lat in Vietnam, Ipoh in Malaysia, Jeju in South Korea, Bali in Indonesia, Hualien in Taiwan and Chiang Rai in Thailand. Andrew Smith, Senior Vice President of Supply at Agoda, said coffee gives travelers an easy way into a destination. Agoda said its platform covers more than 6 million holiday properties, 130,000 flight routes and 300,000 activities worldwide.
At the 2026 TravelDaily Summit, Li Shaohua, co-founder and CEO of Beijing Shilv Network Technology, shared his views on travel AI applications and investment trends. He said AI plus travel has entered execution-layer competition: models understand intent, agents organize tasks, but fulfillment still requires travel companies. He personally tested GPT-5.6 for U.S. trip planning and concluded GPT has rewritten the personal travel service process, though booking and payment remain gaps. Surveys show 61% of U.S. consumers use agent services, but only 8% book directly through AI.
Citing Qunar data, Pinchain Tourism reports that the 2026 three-day Mid-Autumn holiday, separated from National Day by only three working days, drove long-haul and outbound demand as travellers combined leave into a 13-day break. Bookings for 'autumn-chasing' routes rose 1.8x week-on-week and night-tour products doubled year-on-year, with Chinese-style parks overtaking international IP parks and Jiangxi's Gexiancun ranking as the hottest attraction. Beijing, Nanjing, Shanghai and seven other cities led hotel demand, where parent and family rooms exceeded 60% of bookings, while county-level short trips also gained. London and Los Angeles entered the top-10 outbound destinations for the first…
On September 23, Meituan announced that its hotel AI product "Jibai" has been upgraded to a flagship edition. The previously free Lite edition mainly helps hotels handle daily data queries, reviews and operational issues; the flagship edition targets high-star and chain hotels, connecting to PMS systems with merchant authorization to help revenue staff make judgments based on hotel conditions and market status. Meituan data shows Jibai AI covers 140,000 merchants with over 300,000 weekly consultations; deep users saw weekly exposure rise over 50% and RevPAR up an average of 11%. The flagship edition has been deployed with an initial 12 high-star and chain hotels, achieving 98% diagnostic re…
Agoda released its 2026 Repeat Visitor Ranking, based on bookings made in the first half of the year, listing Asia's top 10 most revisited destinations. Tokyo claimed the top spot for the first time, overtaking Bangkok. Bali rose to third place for the first time, followed by Seoul and Osaka. Da Nang, Kuala Lumpur, Fukuoka, Taipei and Johor Bahru complete the top 10, with Fukuoka entering for the first time. Agoda says it offers over 6 million holiday properties, more than 130,000 flight routes and over 300,000 activities.
At the Skift Global Forum, Airbnb co-founder and CEO Brian Chesky said the company chose to rebuild around AI rather than layer it onto the existing business. He called AI an existential risk to Airbnb and also its growth engine, accelerating growth and share gains from OTAs and hotels. Airbnb shipped over 600 features this year, nearly twice last year's pace, and nearly half of customer service tickets are now handled by AI in 50 languages. Chesky also said Airbnb will launch its own agent and will eventually welcome chain hotels including Marriott and Hilton.
Skift and McKinsey's seventh annual research collaboration, based on a study of 1,000 consumers and traveler diaries, found the booking journey has transformed from a linear path to an orbit that expands, contracts, and continues well past the transaction. McKinsey partner Constantin said touch points from intention to booking grew from roughly 45 in 2018 to an estimated 65 now. More than 50% of travelers change their minds and rebook after the initial booking, with about 40% seeking better prices and 30% driven by fear of making the wrong choice. More than 70% of travelers use AI for research and comparison, but fewer than 16% are comfortable booking through an AI tool. IHG is rolling out…
In a Skift Global Forum decision brief, Capital One Travel SVP Sarah Moore said Capital One is positioning itself as a travel platform, not just a credit card company. She said launching Capital One Travel in 2021, later than many competitors, allowed it to study the market, understand modern travelers and build technology-first. As a bank, Capital One can use customer information and transaction data for contextual personalization. Moore said more than 70% of Capital One customers look at some kind of event or live experience when they travel, citing partnerships with MLB, touring artists and José Andrés. She also said a dedicated travel app launched in the past year has been heavily utili…
Agoda released a list of six Asian music-festival destinations: Mumbai, Taipei, Busan, Ko Pha Ngan, Uluwatu in Bali and Chonburi. Agoda said global dance events are expanding rapidly across Asia and that superfans will cross borders for a weekend set, a trend in which the line-up determines the destination. Andrew Smith, Senior Vice President, Supply at Agoda, said the line-up has become the destination, and Agoda is also partnering with Eurovision Asia as its Official Travel Partner.
Expedia Group CEO Ariane Gorin said at Skift Global Forum that Expedia will be on Meta's Muse AI agent, with the partnership announced the day before she spoke. She described a case-by-case, experimental approach to emerging agent platforms, with teams engaging Google, OpenAI, Anthropic and Meta. Gorin said AEO (answer engine optimization) is now Expedia's fastest-growing channel and that paid advertising in AI environments is starting to evolve. Expedia reversed course from a single end-to-end agent to modular AI agents reused across brands, while strengthening direct channels through bundling, servicing and loyalty.
Meadin Research released its 2026 Autumn Travel Insight Report, finding that autumn travel started earlier, lasted longer and reached farther, driven by extended-holiday arrangements and new autumn school breaks in several regions. Tongcheng data showed searches for Mid-Autumn and National Day keywords rose 278% month-on-month as of September 14, while Qunar reported a 119% month-on-month surge in flight-and-hotel bookings. Bookings for domestic long-haul flights over 1,200 km rose 34% year-on-year, and hotel stays of five nights or more increased about 7 percentage points. The report divides September to November into five autumn phases and identifies three trends: a shift toward expectati…
Trip.Biz, Trip.com Group's business-travel arm, unveiled its Agent ONE AI suite at the Transform 2026 summit in Singapore, comprising planning, booking, approval and insight agents, claiming it cuts average booking time from about 45 minutes to 2 minutes and approval waits from over an hour to under 3 seconds. Meanwhile, a Phocuswright report shows India's travel market grew just 1% to $41.7 billion in 2025, with a 13% rebound to $47.2 billion expected in 2026. Cloudbeds and Klook launched a two-way distribution integration, and WTTC, JATA and Tourism EXPO Japan signed an MOU.
According to Skift, Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky said at Skift Global Forum that the company will launch its own AI agent in 2027, adding that the new interface would be 'much richer than a chatbot.' Chesky has previously described Airbnb's future as an 'agentic app' and an eventual AI concierge. On the August earnings call, he said that within roughly 12 to 18 months travelers would be able to bring a broad request, such as planning a family trip to Europe, and have the platform help assemble the trip. Just two weeks before the forum, he told Goldman Sachs the company was still piloting richer AI interfaces.
On September 23, Meituan announced an upgrade to its hotel AI product Jibai with the launch of a flagship edition targeting upscale and chain hotels, offering full-chain AI support spanning market insight, operational diagnosis and performance review. With merchant authorization, the flagship edition can connect to hotel PMS and other local operating systems to consolidate data scattered across channels. Meituan said the flagship edition has been co-built with a first batch of upscale and chain hotels, achieving 98% diagnostic accuracy and a 20% gain in full-chain management efficiency; merchants deeply using Jibai saw RevPAR rise an average of 11%.
At the 2026 Hangzhou Yunqi Conference, Fliggy and Alibaba Cloud Bailian announced the launch of a travel AI hackathon, open to all individual developers, with outstanding works and developers receiving token subsidies, expert coaching and commercial ecosystem resources. The two-month event has preset topics including hotel staycations, destination exploration, AI private guides and inbound-travel assistants, plus an open track. It is built on Fliggy's AI open platform and flyai skill, giving developers access to price and inventory data across flights, hotels, tickets, car services and destination activities, with Alibaba Cloud Bailian providing models and workflows.
At the 2026 Hangzhou Yunqi Conference, Fliggy and Alibaba Cloud Bailian announced the industry's first travel AI hackathon, open to all individual developers, with outstanding works and developers receiving token subsidies, expert coaching and commercial ecosystem resources. The two-month event has preset topics including hotel staycations, destination exploration, AI private guides and inbound-travel assistants, plus an open track. It is built on Fliggy's AI open platform and flyai skill, giving developers access to price and inventory data across flights, hotels, tickets, car services and destination activities, with Alibaba Cloud Bailian providing models and workflows.
In the first half of this year, listed Chinese OTAs continued to grow overall, but the growth logic is changing. Ctrip's net revenue was RMB 31.871 billion, up 11.15% year on year, while net profit attributable to shareholders fell to RMB 4.1 million due to an antitrust penalty. Tongcheng Travel's revenue was RMB 9.993 billion, up 10.5%, with net profit of RMB 1.411 billion, up 7.67%. Tuniu's net revenue was about RMB 272 million, up 7.58%, but profitability came under pressure. Ctrip is betting on international business, with inbound tourism orders up 95% year on year in H1 and international platform revenue growth exceeding 50% in Q2. Tongcheng Travel expanded into hotel management and hi…
The 2026 Abu Dhabi China Travel Trade Summit, hosted by the Department of Culture and Tourism – Abu Dhabi (DCT Abu Dhabi), brought 108 Chinese travel industry executives and senior managers to Abu Dhabi, spanning leisure travel and MICE, including representatives from Ctrip, Tongcheng, Tuniu, Zhongxin Travel, Zhuohui Travel and Shenzhen China International Travel Service. Delegates met with 63 Abu Dhabi hotels, attractions, cultural institutions and ground handlers, generating more than 1,500 one-on-one business meetings over two days. Chinese citizens currently enjoy visa-free entry to Abu Dhabi; direct routes jointly operated by Etihad Airways and China Eastern Airlines cover multiple cor…
On September 23, 2026, the Opera Festival opened in Zhouzhuang, Kunshan, Jiangsu, hosted by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism and the Jiangsu Provincial Government, running until November. The event features classic operas and launches the 'Watch Operas, Tour Jiangsu' cultural tour, with OTA platforms like Ctrip launching promotion zones and organizing eight domestic and international influencers for immersive experiences.
On September 23, Tongcheng Travel's international platform HopeGoo launched the 2026 "Hi Zhejiang" Hangzhou inbound-travel consumption vouchers, its first time distributing a government-led inbound-travel voucher program. Foreign and Hong Kong/Macau/Taiwan users can claim hotel and attraction ticket vouchers via the HopeGoo app: 20% off hotel bookings over RMB 210, capped at RMB 210 off, and 20% off attraction tickets, capped at RMB 60 off. Vouchers are valid for seven days from claim, with one per category per user. The first batch runs from September 23 to December 25, 2026, for stays and visits through December 31, 2026.
With only three days between this year's Mid-Autumn Festival and National Day holiday, the 'take 3 days off for 13 days' leave strategy has gone viral, pushing hotel bookings into a peak period. Meituan data show Shaanxi's overall culture and tourism bookings rose 50% year on year during the holiday, with hotel and homestay bookings up 49%. Gao Wen, manager of Xi'an Yaman Oriental Courtyard Hotel, said Mid-Autumn was the hottest period, with occupancy near 80% on Sept 25-26, while the National Day peak shifted to Oct 2-3. Platform data show users booking flights to two or more destinations rose 70% year on year. Hoteliers report a rising share of 4-5 night stays, with both average spend and…
Speaking at Skift Global Forum 2026, Expedia Group CEO Ariane Gorin said she wants to work with the newest generation of AI agents, including Meta's new agent Muse, but does not believe any single agent can take over the entire travel journey. Expedia had revealed on Tuesday that it would be available on Muse; its X post said only that users can tell Muse where they are headed and it can work with Expedia to sort hotels and everything in between, without detailing how it works. Gorin, participating via remote video, did not elaborate on the partnership but said she personally does not believe a large portion of bookings will become an end-to-end conversational experience, since travel plann…
Booking Holdings CEO Glenn Fogel said at the Skift Global Forum in New York City that building an AI travel agent like Instinct wouldn't be that hard, but the real challenge is establishing trust. He argued there is more to travel than handling the transaction, and that travelers want to deal with real people when safeguarding credit card details and other sensitive information. Booking Holdings is still moving forward with AI initiatives, including its ad deal with OpenAI and integration on Google.
Tongcheng Travel data shows that as of 23 September 2026, university students' share of travel product bookings during the Mid-Autumn and National Day period rose about 10 percentage points year on year. Student flight booking heat rose over 45% year on year, with first-time flyers exceeding 30%; hotel and homestay bookings rose over 38%; and attraction ticket bookings rose 27%. Dozens of Chinese universities combined the two holidays into a 13-day break, driving hometown visits, campus-area micro-vacations and long-haul cross-province trips. Tongcheng also upgraded its domestic 'first-flight无忧' service to 58 partner airports with 237 convenience services.
The Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei and Yangtze River Delta regional tourism promotion exchange event was recently held in Suzhou, Jiangsu, initiated by the Beijing Municipal Bureau of Culture and Tourism and co-hosted with tourism authorities of Tianjin, Hebei, Shanghai, Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Anhui. During the event, tourism associations and travel agency representatives from both regions signed letters of intent on mutual visitor exchange, agreeing on joint route development, product co-creation, brand co-promotion and market expansion. Tongcheng Travel, together with the Beijing bureau, launched a "Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei x Yangtze River Delta north-south mutual travel consumption feature" and platf…
Expedia Group announced a multi-year marketing collaboration with Redion (formerly Europ Assistance worldwide and Generali Global Assistance in the U.S.), marking the first time a travel insurance and assistance brand has joined Expedia Group Advertising as a dedicated partner and opening an entirely new advertiser category. The two companies have worked together for more than 15 years, with Redion providing travel protection to Expedia Group customers; this collaboration moves the relationship beyond product distribution into a strategic advertising alliance with co-branded editorial, on-platform experiences and targeted activations rolling out across Expedia Group brands from Q3 2026. Exp…
The 2026 TravelDaily Summit & Digital Travel Show was held on September 22-23, 2026 at the Shanghai International Convention Center under the theme of change, drawing more than 1,700 senior executives from OTA, hotel, airline, cruise, TMC, destination, travel technology, cultural-tourism consumption and investment segments. Sessions covered AI-driven industry change, shifts in global travel consumption and the restructuring of travel supply chains. TravelDaily CEO Li Chao said that as AI enters travel search, planning, customer service, development and operations, competition will return to the industrial base: real supply, inventory and pricing, fulfillment efficiency, experience design, c…
On 20 September, Meituan launched airline membership benefits with Air China, China Eastern, China Southern, Hainan Airlines and others. Black Gold and Black Diamond members can access exclusive fares and a 'price-match guarantee' on designated routes, plus a coupon pack with six RMB 5 no-threshold vouchers usable for dining, lodging and activities at destinations, expected to cover tens of millions of members. Meituan data showed National Day flight bookings by Black Diamond and Black Gold members rose 138% and 66% year on year as of 20 September, while long-haul bookings for the combined Mid-Autumn and National Day holidays grew 55%.