Hot 25 Travel Startups for 2026: Innovation Shaping Travel’s Future

The travel industry remains a fertile ground for innovation, even amid tightening startup funding, rapid advances in artificial intelligence (AI) and broader economic and geopolitical uncertainty. Founders, investors and industry leaders continue to show enthusiasm for the breakthroughs and new business models AI is driving across the sector.

Since PhocusWire published its first Hot 25 Travel Startups list in late 2018, the team has tracked 175 companies across every major travel segment and region. The Hot 25 Travel Startups for 2026 continue this tradition, representing standout innovators from Asia Pacific, the Middle East, the U.K., the U.S. and Latin America.

The PhocusWire–Phocuswright team began evaluating more than 150 startups back in July, prioritizing companies that demonstrate strong innovation, clear market potential, and diversity across founding teams, technologies and geographies. Ten of this year’s honorees are very early stage—founded in 2024 or 2025—while many others were launched during or after the COVID-19 pandemic, reflecting resilience and sharp market focus.

AI has become a defining feature of the 2026 cohort. While last year’s list included about 10 AI-driven startups, 60 percent of this year’s honorees are building with AI at their core. Emerging technologies such as blockchain and decentralized ID also have representation.

Mike Coletta, Phocuswright’s senior manager of research and innovation, noted that in today’s climate, the most successful travel startups will be AI-native and highly adaptable.
“Travel startup funding is hitting multi-year lows even as AI-native founders report enormous productivity gains,” he said. “Capital is concentrating in a tiny slice of companies while exits remain tight. The winners will be AI-native companies leapfrogging legacy stacks with agent-ready services built for the next generation of distribution.”

Tracking the broader startup landscape

Now in its eighth year, the Hot 25 series has recognized 200 companies, which have collectively raised more than $3.3 billion, according to Phocuswright’s Travel Startups Interactive Database. Some have been acquired or merged, a few have shuttered, but the majority continue to operate and grow.

Across the global travel startup ecosystem, Phocuswright has tracked nearly 8,000 companies, which have secured more than $230 billion in funding across 11,000+ rounds since 2005. While funding ticked up slightly from $5.3 billion in 2023 to $5.8 billion in 2024, it is projected to fall again this year, with only $1.1 billion raised by the end of May.

Meet the Class of 2026

For each of the startups selected for 2026, founders share their company descriptions, goals for the year ahead and lessons learned since launch. Explore the full list below to see what they are building and what’s coming next:

Arcube
Becoming RentABLE
BizTrip.AI
Bonafide
Buzz
Cruisebound
Dazhboards
DirectBooker
E23
GuestOS
HeyMax
HiGem
Hospy
HostAI
Indicio
Kaiban
Kismet
Landng
Meili
Nowadays
Roamr
SkyLink
VanityPass
Walkway
Xsite

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