Almost a fifth of young UK adults use AI to design holiday, study finds

Almost one in five young adults are turning to artificial intelligence to design their holiday, according to the UK travel industry body Abta.

While the traditional package holiday still remains the most common eventual purchase, Abta found that 18% of 25- to 34-year-olds were using AI tools such as ChatGPT to inspire their trips abroad.

The generational divide remains stark, with fewer than 3% of over-55s citing AI as a source of holiday ideas – and 25% of Britons overall still reaching for a traditional brochure.

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The travel association said it expected the role of the technology to increase sharply, with almost two in five saying they would be confident to allow an AI assistant to book their travel.

In research unveiled at its annual travel industry convention in Magaluf, on the Spanish island of Mallorca, Abta also said the proportion of Britons who took a holiday last year had almost returned to its pre-pandemic peak, with increasing confidence in foreign travel.

About 87% of people surveyed by Abta took a holiday at home or abroad last year, with an ever higher proportion of people citing a break as the most important discretionary spend, above leisure, gadgets and entertainment, even in difficult economic times.

The trade body’s chief executive, Mark Tanzer, said the increasing use of AI reflected consumer behaviour across all industries, adding: “For our sector, the challenge is to harness the potential which AI has to support our businesses, while continuing to celebrate and champion the value of the personal touch and expertise which comes with booking with a travel agent or tour operator.”

Twice as many people are using AI for holiday planning than a year ago, the poll of about 2,000 UK adults in July found, with 8% of respondents saying they rely on it for inspiration, up from 4% in the 2024 survey.

It also found that 25- to 34-year-olds were most likely to describe a holiday as “important for their mental health”, at 90% compared with the 80% average, and twice as likely – 20% to 10% – to say they choose a company, hotel or destination based on its environmental commitments.

Some expressed scepticism at that claim. Steve Heapy, the chief executive of the airline and tour operator Jet2, said: “Everyone wants to be greener – but if it’s costing more money, they tend to think twice about it.”

However, he added that younger holidaymakers “seem to be a lot more responsible and healthier living than when I was young – we’ve got to understand that, because it is the future”.

Heapy also criticised moves by the Spanish tourism authorities to change the profile of visitors, after overtourism protests this summer.

Spain is hoping to promote longer stays and slower travel, in a new €30m (£26m) advertising campaign that moves the focus away from traditional beach holidays. Manuel Butler, the UK director of the Spanish Tourist Office, said the country was now “chasing diversification not volume”.

Heapy said: “When you boil down what they’ve said, we want a different type of customer – they basically want rich people. Given Spain is supposed to be a socialist utopia, it doesn’t sound very socialist that they want just rich people here … If a prerequisite to going on holiday is being rich, I think that’s absolutely disgraceful.”

He said problems in Spain and elsewhere with too many visitors were down to “unlicensed tourism” rather than big operators and intensified his calls for governments to clamp down on instances of Airbnb owners where someone “doesn’t have a tourism licence, doesn’t have a health and safety certificate, and possibly not paying tax”.

He said that if owners were found to not have the right certificates and tax records, “you get fined. If you don’t do that, you go to jail. All the unlicensed properties will disappear overnight. People should take individual responsibility, get registered, get it done.”