What travellers want in 2026, and what a small place should do
A big travel report, read from the point of view of someone with one flat to let — and a shortlist of what not to chase.
Every autumn the big platforms publish their travel predictions, and every autumn hosts read headlines about robots and astrology and conclude that the industry has lost its mind.
It's worth reading them anyway, for one reason: they are the largest surveys anyone runs on what guests are thinking, and no host has anything comparable. The trick is separating the two or three findings that change what you do on Monday from the ones written to be quoted in a newspaper.
Here is that separation, done on Booking's 2026 report.
Three findings worth acting on
Booking surveyed 29,733 people across 33 countries in July and August 2025, all of them planning to travel within one to two years, and published the results in October 2025. Out of ten announced trends, three say something concrete about the people who will sleep in your rooms:
- 75% describe a trip as a deserved reward for hard work, and 67% say they don't need a reason to book one at all. Travel is being framed as something earned, not as an annual ritual.
- 68% would buy design-led kitchenware while travelling, and 55% would pick a destination known for its food products. The kitchen has become part of the trip, not just part of the flat.
- 66% would use technology to revisit places tied to personal memories, and 46% are drawn to destinations that feel like home or like a connection to their past.
The thread running through all three is the same, and it is not a gadget: people want the trip to be about them. That is achievable in a two-room flat, and it costs almost nothing.
What to actually change
None of the three findings above requires a renovation, a gadget, or a new listing photo. They require noticing who is arriving, and writing three or four things down.
- Treat the kitchen as part of the destination. If two thirds of travellers are thinking about local food products, the least you can do is say where to buy them. The bakery, the market day, the shop that still makes something by hand — with the walking time and what to ask for. It costs one paragraph and it is the sort of detail that ends up in reviews.
- Ask why they're coming, once. A single line in the message before arrival — “anything we're celebrating?” — is enough. With three quarters of travellers treating a trip as a reward, a birthday or a new job is common, and knowing it turns a standard welcome into a specific one. A note and a bottle cost less than the review they produce.
- Recommend places with a reason attached. Not a list of twenty restaurants: three places with one line each on why you go there. Guests drawn to somewhere that feels like a connection are not looking for coverage, they're looking for a point of view. Yours is the only one they can't get from an app.
- Write it where they'll actually see it. All of the above is worth nothing inside a chat thread that scrolls away. It belongs in the guide they open on arrival, next to the Wi-Fi password — the page they will open anyway.
How to read a report like this
Three habits are enough, and they apply to every trend piece you'll read this winter.
First, look for the question. A number attached to “would you consider” or “would you be open to” measures curiosity; a number attached to “did you book” measures behaviour. The two are not comparable, and reports tend to lead with the first.
Second, look at who is publishing. Booking sells accommodation and wants the coming year to look exciting; that doesn't make the data false, it makes the emphasis interested. The methodology here is stated openly — sample, countries, fieldwork dates — which is more than many reports do, and it's the reason this one is worth quoting at all.
Third, ask whether a finding survives translation to your street. “Travellers want personalisation” is a headline. “Guests want to know where to buy the local cheese, and want the kitchen to work” is the same finding, in a form you can act on before the weekend.
The version of this you can do this week
Add the food shops to your guide, with times and what to ask for. Add one line to your pre-arrival message asking whether there's an occasion. Cut your restaurant list down to three and explain each one. That's the whole of a 29,733-person study, applied to one flat.
If your guide is still a PDF or a folder on the table, tulligo turns it into something guests open from their phone, in their own language, where all of this lives in one place instead of in a chat. Three days free, no card required.