The travel industry has seen enough crises over the decades to know the difference between panic and adjustment. What we’re seeing now is not retreat, it’s recalibration.
According to the latest report from the Mastercard Economics Institute, travellers aren’t abandoning their plans in the face of geopolitical tensions, rising fuel costs, or economic unease. They’re simply getting smarter about how they move.
That distinction matters.
“We are in a world of high uncertainty and have been for some time,” said Michelle Meyer. “While there has been volatility, we continue to see healthy spending on travel across consumers and businesses.”
In other words, the will to travel hasn’t budged. Only the method has.
Less romance, more arithmetic
There was a time not so long ago when travel decisions were driven by aspiration. A glossy brochure, a well-placed recommendation, perhaps a long lunch and a bit of dreaming.
Today, it’s closer to a spreadsheet exercise.
Exchange rates are dictating destinations. Travellers are quietly swapping strong-currency countries for better-value alternatives. A holiday is still a holiday, but increasingly, it needs to make financial sense before anything else.
That doesn’t mean people are spending less. Far from it. The global economy, for now, is holding together better than expected. Employment remains solid, wages are broadly keeping pace with inflation, and discretionary spending, including travel, continues to flow.
But the behaviour has changed.
People are travelling differently, not less.
Shorter stays. Smarter timing. Shoulder seasons are back in favour, and the idea of paying peak-season premiums is starting to feel faintly old-fashioned.
Business travel quietly redraws the map
Corporate travel is telling its own story, and it’s not centred where you might expect.
The report highlights a surge in momentum across cities like Hyderabad and Bangalore, both climbing into the upper ranks of business travel activity. Abu Dhabi, meanwhile, tops the list for growth in corporate travel relative to leisure, at least before the latest Middle East tensions came into play.
There’s a clear pattern if you look closely enough.
The cities gaining ground are those tied to technology, artificial intelligence and digital industries. Business travel follows the work, and the work is increasingly happening in places that didn’t dominate the map a decade ago.
That shift is unlikely to reverse anytime soon.
AI: less hype, more influence
Artificial intelligence, for all the noise surrounding it, is already doing something quite practical in travel; it’s making people more selective.
Rather than defaulting to the usual suspects, travellers are branching out. Historical towns, emerging wine regions, wellness retreats destinations that might once have required insider knowledge are now appearing with a few well-phrased prompts.
Then there’s the rise of “dupe destinations” a term that would have sounded faintly ridiculous five years ago but now makes perfect sense.
Why pay top dollar for a crowded icon when a quieter, cheaper alternative offers much the same experience?
It’s not about cutting corners. It’s about avoiding them.
Interestingly, the data shows that users of AI tools tend to spend more, not less, particularly on accommodation, where their share of spend is roughly double that of non-users.
That’s not thrift. That’s confidence.
People still travel like themselves
For all the change, some habits remain stubbornly intact.
The report notes that travellers’ spending patterns still reflect where they come from as much as where they’re going. British visitors in Japan lean into rail travel. Singaporeans favour retail. In the United States, shopping accounts for around 28 per cent of tourist spending overall, but visitors from Mexico push that figure to a striking 54 per cent.
These aren’t anomalies. They’re predictable behaviours, and for destinations paying attention, they’re valuable signals.
Get the alignment right between product and visitor preferences, and spending will follow naturally.
The real story: travel isn’t going anywhere
There’s been no shortage of reasons to stay home over the past few years. A pandemic, wars, inflation, and political instability, you could make a convincing case for sitting tight.
And yet, people keep booking.
Not blindly. Not extravagantly. But consistently.
“The travel economy is ever changing,” Meyer said. “The decision to travel will remain a function of geopolitical dynamics, a search for value and the personal motivations people have driving the decision to travel.”
That’s a polite way of saying what the industry already knows: people will always find a reason to go somewhere.
The question is no longer if they travel.
It’s how cleverly they do it.
A final word for the trade
For operators, agents and destinations, the message is straightforward though not necessarily easy.
You’re dealing with a more informed customer. One who compares, questions and, increasingly, arrives with a plan already shaped by technology.
The old playbook sells the dream and hopes it sticks, but it won’t quite cut it.
Value matters. Flexibility matters. Authenticity, that overused word, actually matters again.
Because in a world that feels uncertain, travellers aren’t looking for perfection.
They’re looking for confidence.
And that, as ever, is something the industry has to earn.
by May Marclay – (c) 2026.
Read Time: 5 minutes.
About the Author.
May Marclay’s career hasn’t followed a straight line, and she’s better for it. She began in real estate, then moved into hospitality, finding her rhythm with Centara in the Maldives. There, she worked the Asian markets the old-fashioned way: building trust, closing deals, and turning conversations into lasting business.
The UAE sharpened its focus. At IHG, supporting an Area General Manager, she saw the machinery of a major travel hub from the inside, no gloss, just how things actually get done.
Now, with her sights set on healthcare, May brings a broader lens than most. She speaks three languages, reads widely, travels with intent, and writes with the calm assurance of someone who understands both the detail and the bigger picture without needing to say so too loudly.
