It's good news for the tepid travel sector, which took the maximum beating since the Covid-19 pandemic outbreak last year in March. With the Covid-19 vaccination accelerating across the globe and with falling infection rates across several European countries, the travel app category has witnessed strong year-over-year growth during Q2 2021.
According to the latest reports, the downloads of travel apps has swelled by 104%. Also, downloads reached 143 million installs, up 14% versus H1 2020 on Google Play and Apple's App Store respectively, Sensor Tower report said.
Though the travel aggregator apps were significantly impacted by the Covid-19 outbreak things now seem to be falling back in shape. During the summer of 2021, downloads of hotel booking apps and full-service travel aggregators were approaching pre-pandemic levels.
Booking.com reached nearly 3 million downloads in Europe in July 2021, a new all-time high exceeding its peaks during the summer months before the pandemic.
From January to August 2021, Booking.com saw an average of 1.7 million downloads per month compared to competitors Tripadvisor, Trivago, Skyscanner, Tutu.ru, and Aviasales, which collectively saw 267,000 average installs per month.
With the UK and the US expected to relax foreign travel restrictions in the coming months, travel aggregator apps have an opportunity to continue boosting user adoption rates.
Vacation rental apps led the accommodation category recovery in the summer of 2021. Airbnb was the top accommodation app, surpassing 6 million installs between January to August 2021, with user adoption reaching its highest point during the year in July at 1.2 million downloads.
