Top OTAs all saw traffic growth in December

Similarweb's Travel Market Update for December 2022 shows the 4 biggest Online Travel Agencies (OTAs) all saw growth in search traffic in December.

But Booking.com dominated, achieving 28% growth year-on-year and taking share from competitors.

Results by the numbers:

• Booking.com +28.10%
• Expedia +16.85%
• Tripadvisor +15.05%
• Airbnb +6.37%

In aggregate, the 4 OTAs saw 15.60% more traffic in December 2022 than in December 2021.

Traffic growth vs. November 2022 ranged from +6.77% (Expedia) to +8.79% (Tripadvisor).

Booking.com took nearly 2 percentage points from competitors, while all others lost share.

But Tripadvisor remained the leader in terms of absolute traffic share:

• Tripadvisor 32%
• Airbnb 24%
• Expedia 24%
• Booking.com 20%

Similarweb disclaims any responsibility for the accuracy of these numbers which they say are based on 3rd-party data and "estimations and extrapolations based" on same.

Both Booking.com (NASDAQ:BKNG) and Airbnb (NASDAQ:ABNB) stocks took a hit last week as some analysts dropped BKNG from BUY to HOLD and ABNB from HOLD to SELL, likely based on the damping effect rising inflation and the down economy are having on travel. But not all analysts agree, appraising both stocks as BUYs.

Comment: There could be no better leading indicator of travel-industry performance than these companies and their stocks. Keep watching them.

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