Boom in flight searches to the United States after reopening

With the lifting of restrictions, flight searches to the United States are exploding. After more than a year and a half of border closures, the United States reopens to non-essential travel: a long-awaited easing of restrictions that finally unlocks the great flow of European outbound travel.

The measure concerns both air and land travel but attention remains high: entry into the country is only allowed to those who have received two doses of a vaccine approved by the FDA and, even then, they are asked to show a negative test.

Exponential growth in searches

Despite the rigidity of the guidelines in the Decree Biden, the news had a strong impact on the travel industry, to the point that the official announcement from the American authorities caused flight searches to explode: on September 20, travelers from around the world started searching for flights to U.S. airports again, and within 24 hours searches increased by 112%. This sudden peak in demand lasted for three days, then decreased but remained significant. The demand pressure, in fact, remained very high and the search trend increased substantially: after the announcement, searches continued to increase at an average daily rate of +2.9%.

Europe is the primary market: United Kingdom, Spain, and Italy in the lead

It seems, therefore, that U.S. incoming travel is experiencing a real growth moment, confirmed by a certain stability in search trends. The most active market for the USA is primarily the domestic one, which accounts for 39.3% of demand: this figure is predictable considering the country’s vast geography and Americans’ habit of traveling by plane. But considering tourist incoming, the top market is Europe: the United Kingdom, Spain, and Italy are the countries with the strongest travel intentions and together account for 21.1% of all demand. Absent from this list are China and Russia: as with Europe, these important markets are blocked due to vaccine recognition issues, as both EMA and FDA recognize only three (Moderna, Pfizer, and J&J).

New York and Miami the most searched

Most user searches are directed towards the East Coast: the New York area, which includes JFK and Newark airports, has the highest number of searches (23%); for Florida, the share is 10%. Regarding the West Coast, the most desired destinations are Miami (9%), Los Angeles (8%), San Francisco (4%), and Las Vegas (4%).