AI now inspires more than half of travelers
For years, tourism boards (DMOs) controlled the first touchpoint: a traveler discovered a destination on their website and started planning there. AI has disrupted that sequence. A study by Mindtrip, Sabre, Sojern and MMGY shows that 54% of travelers already use AI to plan their trips. Inspiration no longer comes from the official site, it comes from a chat.
This is not a passing trend, it's a channel shift. If half of your potential visitors get suggestions from a language model, your destination must be present in those ecosystems: structured content that AI can cite, updated feeds, and visibility in the tools people open before deciding.
DMOs that keep treating their website as the center of the universe will miss the boat. The good news: those who optimize for AI capture the traffic of people who don't even know they're looking for your destination yet. The first step is understanding that inspiration is now negotiated in the prompt, not in the banner.
Quick questions
How many travelers use AI for planning?
What is a DMO and why does AI affect it?
How can a destination adapt to AI?
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Is it a fad or a permanent shift?
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