- Adobe sees big growth in AI referrals to travel sites
- Rich, structured content is the best way to ensure visibility of the AI engine
- Hotels lead the way, airlines fail to be fully accessible to LLMs
Combined traffic analysis and market research has led Adobe to see a 194% year-over-year increase in traffic to US travel websites, and an even more striking 2,215% increase since it began tracking AI referrals in October 2024.
The data implies that AI is used for much more than research, as its use cases span planning, recommendations, packaging and even budgeting.
With 86% of travelers believing AI has improved their trip planning experience, it’s clear that consumers are finding better recommendations, producing more personalized itineraries, and getting access to cheaper prices, making it an option for financially savvy consumers.
AI traffic to travel sites reveals major trend
While AI traffic still generates about 28% worse than traditional traffic, Adobe says this is changing and the gap has narrowed by almost 70% since October 2024. AI-referred users now spend 70% more time on websites, are 21% more engaged, and have 41% lower bounce rates, which could translate into higher purchase intent.
With this in mind, travel websites should take advantage of this new type of traffic by optimizing pages for LLMs. Adobe says that “rich, structured content” is to thank for the levels of success that hotel websites have already experienced, but airline websites are lagging behind.
Adobe used its own AI Content Visibility Checker metrics to reveal that hotels and car rental companies perform better on both the homepage and product pages, but even then, around a third of the content is still unreadable to AI.
“As consumer adoption of artificial intelligence tools accelerates, brands must ensure that their digital presence is not only attractive to humans, but also fully accessible to machines,” the company summarized.
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