New findings exclusive for ABTA members, from the association’s Holiday Habits 2025-26 survey, reveal which consumer priorities are driving the booking decision.

ABTA presented survey respondents with some of the things people consider when deciding to book a holiday and asked them to rank these based on which ones they felt were the most important. 

While the detailed results will be shared with ABTA members only, the headline finding is that 45% of people ranked ‘destination’ as their most important consideration when deciding on booking a holiday, rising to 57% for those aged 65+years.  This was followed by just over a third of people (33%) saying ‘cost’ was most important and 12% who said ‘holiday dates’ were most important.

The research, ‘Driving the booking decision: An ABTA analysis’, revealed last week at a member event at WTM, will be available exclusively in the ABTA.com Member Zone.

The paper dives deeper into the results to show how the bigger ‘booking deciders’ can help members with their marketing and general business planning. It is segmented by six age groups and four life stages to support more targeted initiatives.

Members can discover which groups rank ‘cost’ as their biggest booking decision driver and those to whom ‘sustainability’ ranks as their most important booking decider. The research also reveals who prioritises the importance of ‘the company providing the holiday’ and ‘holiday dates’ as factors driving the booking decision.

Graeme Buck, Director of Communications at ABTA – The Travel Association, said: “This new analysis allows us to better understand the motivating factors behind the booking decision. Destination is king but not the only consideration – there’s plenty for our members to get their teeth into.”