Travellers look East as booking windows normalise, says Skyscanner report

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Travellers look East as booking windows normalise, says Skyscanner report

APAC destinations are particularly benefitting from increased search

Global travel marketplace Skyscanner has released a report exploring the latest trends in global travel. 

Titled ‘Skyscanner Horizons: Destination &  Booking Insights Q1 2023’, the report unpacks and explores extensive flight search and booking data from each region – the Americas, APAC and EMEA – to provide a view of how travellers are thinking about travel over the next six months.

Analysis of key indicators including booking windows segmented by haul type and trending destinations provides unrivalled insights for any business within the travel ecosystem.

The report also features exclusive expert commentary on these trends from industry thought leaders such as Mike Ferguson from Skyscanner, Centre for Aviation’s Marco Navarria, and Nick Hall of Digital Tourism Think Tank. 

“Globally, we’re seeing more travellers come to Skyscanner than ever before. It’s indicative of both the sector’s continued recovery and the exceptional travel demand across all regions,” said Mike Ferguson, director of destination marketing at Skyscanner.

“Destinations, particularly in APAC, are benefiting from increased search volumes compared to last year and, at the same time, long-haul booking windows are lengthening. Long-haul international travel has been slower to recover than other segments, but 2023 looks set to change that.”

Marco Navarria, global content and marketing director at CAPA, added, “Skyscanner’s important Horizons report once again reaffirms the industry results CAPA has seen within the aviation industry. The report has highlighted that the majority of trending destinations for summer travel are in Asia Pacific.

“CAPA data shows that Asia Pacific airlines posted a +376.3% increase in Jan 2023 international traffic compared to Jan 2022, by far the strongest year-over-year rate among all the world’s regions, but off a very low base. Capacity rose 167.1% and the load factor increased 36.6 percentage points to 83.3%, the highest among the regions.”

Nick Hall, chief executive of Digital Tourism Think Tank said, “The resurgence of long-haul travel globally is a key opportunity for destinations to seize, competing to win over high-value travellers undeterred by a challenging economic climate.”

 Key report findings for each region include:  

Global

  • The majority of trending destinations for Q2 and Q3 travel are in APAC, with Japan, China, Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia and Taiwan benefiting

  • +90 day booking windows for long haul travel are up across all regions signalling both traveller confidence and demand, with search share moving in line with pre-pandemic seasonal norms

EMEA

  • EMEA travellers looking ahead to summer as longer booking windows increase for both short and long haul travel

  • All booking windows are tracking close to 2019 search behaviour as trip planning normalises

  • EMEA travellers are eager to return to destinations in Asia with Taiwan, Japan and Laos seeing surging search demand compared to 2022. Destinations such as Saudi Arabia and China see high demand in the short term, with Malaysia, Japan, South Korea and Vietnam also trending throughout Q2 and Q3

  • Albania, the only trending European destination in the top 10, sees increased search demand year-on-year

AMER

  • AMER travellers looking ahead as longer booking windows, particularly 60-89 days, increase for all haul type

  • Fluctuations in short haul booking windows vs 2019, while long haul returns to pre-pandemic norm

  • AMER travellers are eager to return to destinations in Asia as the region sees surging search demand compared to 2022. Other long-haul destinations such as Morocco, New Zealand and Norway are also trending throughout Q2 and Q3

  • Bucket list destination Fiji also sees increased year-on-year search demand particularly in July and August

APAC

  • Long haul travel top of mind for APAC travellers as booking windows increase in all segments from <1 week to +90 days

  • APAC booking windows some way off returning to 2019 patterns across all haul types

  • Taiwan, Laos and Japan are trending destinations for APAC travellers, with significant increases in search volumes compared to 2022

  • APAC travellers also looking for inspiration with ‘Everywhere’ a top trending search term, whilst European destinations Austria and Hungary see rising year-on-year search demand

  • Japan, Thailand and Vietnam make up over two thirds of trending search volumes in Q2 and Q3

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