India and Indonesia with their large young populations of ‘digital natives’ are, unsurprisingly, the top two countries with the most digitally-advanced travellers, with India holding the top spot for the second year in a row (2017 & 2018).
Brazil (up one spot to third), China (slipped to fourth place from second) and Nigeria (unchanged) make up the top five on the Travelport Global Digital Traveller league table (see table below).
The Index is based on a combination of the main indicators of using technology to enhance the travel experience. For example, India in the #1 position is due to 69% of the country’s travellers using voice search, over 60% wanting digital room keys and 88% saying they are influenced to travel by friends on social media.
*new country surveyed in 2018
Commenting on the index Mark Meehan, managing director for Asia Pacific, Middle East and Africa of Travelport, said: “India and Indonesia have grown around the smartphone and it’s no surprise to see them remain the most digitally engaged in our survey.”
He added that companies wanting to do business in these countries “need to understand how digitally advanced they are and meet the travellers in the digital platforms they’re using, like instant messaging apps and social media. Travel brands need to provide the seamless, integrated experience travellers have told us they want.”
The index is part of the Travelport 2018 Digital Traveler Survey conducted among 16,000 travellers from 25 countries.
Respondents surveyed said mobile devices are as vital for travel as for other aspects of their life.
Findings showed the desire for new technologies, such as voice search, e-payment and digital room keys to simplify and enhance their travel experience is increasing.
Almost half of those surveyed have booked and paid for an entire or part of a trip through their smartphone.
Nine out of 10 now have apps with maps, airlines, weather and social media topping the list of favourites. On average, travellers use 10-12 apps throughout the searching, booking and traveling parts of their trip
The top three most important features identified by leisure travellers in their travel apps are the ability to search and book flights (68%), real-time flight alerts throughout their journey (64%) and being able to see an entire trip itinerary in one place (67%). Only around a fifth of travellers are currently using itinerary management tools.
New technologies are continuing to grow in prominence, said Travelport, with over half of the respondents having used voice to search either during booking or whilst traveling (+3% over last year globally). In China and Turkey, over 70% of travellers are already using voice search. However, in Japan and some parts of Europe, the proportion of travellers using voice search is less than 40%
Almost half of all respondents, both leisure (47%) and business (55%), think the ability to pay using Apple/Android pay (Touch ID) is important or very important
Over half of business travellers asked said they wanted to be able to check in to their hotel via an app, rather than at a reception desk. 50% also wanted to use a digital room key to unlock their hotel room door from their phone.
The respondents also want technology to continue to simplify and enhance the travel experience. Most would happily use biometric scanning to reduce the need for waiting in security lines, with little difference between those travelling for business (81%) and those traveling for leisure (75%).
Most business traveller prefer to check in to their hotel using an app rather than at reception. (Image credit: jacoblund/iStock-Getty Images)
For Nigerian travellers, with one of the youngest populations in this year’s survey, 90% said they were happy to share personal data to speed through customs and immigration
Over two-thirds of travellers think digital boarding passes make travel much easier
“We can all see the way technology is changing almost every aspect of our lives,” said Gordon Wilson, president and CEO of Travelport. “The travel industry has always been about new experiences and adopted new technologies early. This is as true today, with such high demand for voice search and biometric screening, as it was when I joined this industry almost thirty years ago.”
He added Travelport is “busy innovating, inspiring and experimenting with ways to use new technologies to make buying and managing travel continually better. It’s great to see confirmation that today’s travellers are already as excited about future technologies as we are about making them.”
• Featured image credit: manop198/iStock-Getty Images