Asia Pacific had the world’s busiest airport pairs in 2025, says IATA
IATA releases 2025 World Air Transport Statistics
The International Air Transport Association (IATA) has released the latest edition of the World Air Transport Statistics (WATS), providing comprehensive statistical data through to 2025.
Updated annually, WATS provides data related to demand, s [...]
Gemini goes local: What Google’s first Southeast Asia AI report means for travel
Google’s first-ever Gemini Report: Southeast Asia 2026, released on July 14 alongside the local-language rollout of its new “Gemini Spark” agent, claims the chatbot has become the fastest-adopted Google product the region has ever seen – active users more than doubled between April 2025 and [...]
APAC air passenger demand up, amidst overall decline due to fuel prices
The International Air Transport Association (IATA) released data for June 2026 global passenger demand:
Total demand, measured in revenue passenger kilometers (RPK), was down 1.7% compared to June 2025. Excluding the Middle East, demand declined by 0.6%. Total capacity, measured in available [...]
AI surge meets a crowded digital landscape in Thailand’s online travel boom
How local giants, government super-apps, and sky-high AI enthusiasm are reshaping how Thais book their trips
Thailand's digital economy hit $56 billion in 2025 and is on track for $90 billion by 2030, but online travel growth actually cooled off - up just 6% YoY to $11 billion after a 34% jump in 2 [...]
Travel Happiness Index: It’s not the dessert, it’s the vitamins
Amid all the gloom and doom around us, it’s good to get a little happy news now and then, and yesterday Booking.com launched its Travel Happiness Index, which shows that 98% of APAC travellers associate travel with positive emotion, 84% say it helps them reset mentally, and, most tellingly, nine i [...]
Middle East fuel shock reroutes Southeast Asia’s tourism recovery story
Velocity Ventures and Pear Anderson’s SAILOR 2H2026 report frames the second half of 2026 around a single dominant shock: the US-Israel-Iran Middle East conflict and the Strait of Hormuz closure, which more than doubled jet fuel prices, cut 5.2 million seats from Southeast Asian flight schedules ( [...]
APAC consumers are ready for AI agent-led shopping, Accenture research finds
Accenture hosted a media briefing to present findings from its Consumer Pulse Survey 2026 and lay out a framework for how businesses across Asia Pacific should prepare for what it calls "agentic commerce" — a shift in which AI agents research, compare, purchase and manage returns on a consumer's b [...]
APAC hotel distribution sees slower growth, rising regional OTAs, and direct channels under pressure
D-EDGE's 2022–Q1 2026 analysis shows booking growth cooling to 2.7%, Agoda pulling ahead of Booking.com, and wholesalers more than tripling their market share in three years.
According to a new report from hospitality technology provider D-EDGE, Asia-Pacific's hotel distribution landscape is shif [...]
Japan’s secondary cities in the search bar: Why alternative corridors are winning next-gen discovery
The travel search interface has officially fragmented. Discovery is no longer about generating links; it is about answer generation. Driven by AI-curated "Zero-Click" context and vertical video validation across TikTok, Reels, and Shorts, travelers are trading traditional keywords for contextual, wi [...]
Travel professionals in APAC expect growth but risk slowing momentum
Expedia Group has released new research, Mapping the Future of APAC Travel, showing that 65% of travel professionals expect demand for their Asia-Pacific (APAC) travel business to increase over the next two to three years, rising to 78% among loyalty professionals.
Based on a survey of 1,250 trav [...]
