AI agents are here. Travel isn’t ready. Decisions made today will determine who controls the booking, the customer relationship, and the economics of travel commerce.
AI agents are already booking travel. One invite-only booking agent reported more than $1 billion a year in transaction volume, half of which was travel. Investors have already placed their bets on who wins and who loses. Most travel companies are still built for a traveler who searches, scrolls, and clicks.
Direct or third-party distribution used to be the primary choice travel suppliers had to make. Now an agent may decide which brands show up, which system can complete the booking, which card pays, and which loyalty program earns. Hotels alone spend more than $105 billion a year on distribution, and AI companies want a share of it.
The agents are here. Travel is not ready. Travel companies have to connect the dots inside the new travel commerce stack, and Skift Commerce Summit brings senior commerce leaders together around five decisions travel companies have to make now.
Operator Ticket $275 · for the people who run commerce at travel companies. Vendor Ticket $1,500 · capped, limited supply. Group rates: events@skift.com
AI has moved quickly into the travel customer journey for inspiration and planning, but not booking… yet. According to Skift Research, direct suppliers lead with a 49% net comfort score, followed by packaged tours at 37%, travel agents at 34%, loyalty portals at 31%, and OTAs at 20%. AI and chatbots score -7%. [1]
However, Skift Research describes the discovery path shifting from “search-scroll-compare” toward “ask-shortlist-decide.” As soon as travelers gain confidence in booking through AI platforms, space for brands “on the shelf” is poised to shrink. [2]
Hotels, airlines, or other travel retailers are racing to optimize for AI discoverability, but the more control they give to AI platforms, the more they risk losing direct customer relationships. They have to decide how to prioritize what they value most, and whether distribution alone is worth it if they become interchangeable within someone else’s interface.
Travelers are comfortable booking across a wide range of channels, but that also means today’s marketplace has a wider swath of competitors.
Travel’s AI discussion is moving downstream. It’s not only a customer relationship question, but also a technological one. Even if they’re discovered, booked, and integrated into the loyalty ecosystem, brands have to ensure the infrastructure works when an AI agent starts to handle trip management.
It’s one thing for an AI assistant to drive traffic to a brand’s site. The open decision is whether travel companies find it worthwhile to give an agent the tools to compare offers, change or cancel an order, and fix problems on the traveler’s behalf.
A better conversational front end can’t compensate for fragmented inventory, legacy servicing systems, or commerce technology designed for humans.
Banks, card issuers, retailers, membership programs, and technology platforms have built businesses around the traveler without having to own (or even sell) an airline seat or hotel room. They can make money from payments, rewards, subscriptions, advertising, financing, and the broader customer relationship surrounding a trip.
That changes the competitive economics for travel companies. A bank can use travel to increase car…