Family tourism continues to demonstrate its resilience and growth potential. According to data from the first half of 2026, Italy Family Hotels, Italy’s leading hotel consortium exclusively dedicated to families, with more than 160 hotels specializing in holidays with children, generated over 206,000 accommodation enquiries through its portal between January and June, marking a 5.2% increase compared to the same period in 2025.
These figures reinforce Italy Family Hotels’ position as the national benchmark for family holidays and reflect an increasingly structured and informed demand. This growth is accompanied by an ongoing commitment to technological innovation, with new tools designed to make searching for and choosing the ideal family holiday simpler, more intuitive, and more personalized.
One of the most significant trends is the strong growth in international markets. Enquiries submitted in foreign languages increased by 33.2%, driven primarily by English (+120.9%) and French (+57.7%). While the Italian market remains the consortium’s primary audience, interest in Italy’s family-friendly hospitality offering is clearly expanding among international families.
The report also highlights changing booking habits. Families are planning their holidays further in advance, particularly four to six months before departure and within the 31- to 90-day booking window. A one-week stay remains the preferred choice, but demand for shorter holidays and more flexible travel options is increasing, reflecting a market that is becoming more diverse and increasingly oriented towards tailor-made experiences.
Bino AI and the new family review system: what’s new in 2026
To support the evolving needs of the family travel market, Italy Family Hotels continues to invest in digital innovation by introducing two new tools designed to enhance the holiday search and booking experience.
The first innovation is Bino AI, a new intelligent assistant developed to make finding the ideal family holiday faster, easier, and more personalized. Fully integrated into the portal, Bino AI interacts with users to understand the specific needs of each family and recommend the most suitable properties based on a wide range of criteria, including the children’s ages, family composition, preferred destination, travel dates, required services, and the type of holiday experience they are looking for. Powered by artificial intelligence, the search process becomes more intuitive and efficient, reducing the time needed to compare different options while delivering accurate, tailored recommendations. Bino AI puts technology at the service of families, supporting them throughout every stage of the decision-making process. This innovation reflects the consortium’s commitment to investing in advanced digital solutions that meaningfully improve the user experience while anticipating the new ways in which people search for, compare, and book their holidays.
The development of Bino AI was funded for 60% through a grant awarded to Italy Family Hotels by the Chamber of Commerce of Romagna under the Double Transition Call, a program dedicated to fostering innovation and digital transformation within the tourism sector.
At the same time, Italy Family Hotels is launching a new family-focused review system, designed to provide parents with a more reliable and relevant tool when choosing their next holiday. Unlike traditional review platforms, the new system is structured around the factors that matter most to families travelling with children, including the quality of the family welcome, children’s facilities, entertainment, dining, family services, and accommodation. Each review is enriched with contextual information, allowing prospective guests to compare experiences shared by families with similar needs and make more informed decisions. The new review system is designed to increase transparency, highlight authentic guest experiences, and provide member hotels with an additional opportunity to strengthen their visibility and market positioning, transforming reviews into a valuable tool for both customer choice and continuous improvement.
«Behind these figures are families who are increasingly informed, discerning, and aware of what they want, as well as hoteliers who invest every day to make holidays easier, more relaxing, and genuinely suited to children» says Alessandro Zaffi, President of Italy Family Hotels. «For us, innovation is not about replacing the human relationship, which remains at the heart of hospitality, but about equipping ourselves with tools that help us better understand our guests even before they arrive. Bino AI and our new family review system are designed with exactly this purpose in mind: they make it easier for families to find the right hotel while enabling us, as hoteliers, to better understand their needs, improve our services, and create increasingly personalized holiday experiences».
The first-half results and the innovations introduced in 2026 reinforce Italy Family Hotels’ long-term strategy: combining the continued growth of the family tourism sector with ongoing investment in digital innovation. By placing technology at the service of both families and hospitality providers, the consortium aims to support the evolution of one of the most dynamic segments of the Italian tourism industry.
