After sharp increases in the first half of 2026 spurred by climbing oil prices amid the Middle East conflict, travel price hikes should slow for the balance of the year and in 2027, according to a new forecast from the Global Business Travel Association and travel management company Altour. Still, buyers shouldn't expect a return to 2025 pricing levels, according to the forecast.
GBTA and Altour projects full-year 2026 global airfares, blended among premium and economy classes, to increase about 4.7 per cent year over year after rising 0.1 per cent last year, and to go up nearly 1.5 per cent next year. They also project the global average daily hotel rate to increase 3.7 per cent year over year in 2026 and 1.8 per cent in 2027.
"The most acute impacts of the early 2026 energy-related inflation were beginning to ease, but we are likely to see elevated fuel-related inflation for the remainder of the year and the operating environment for business travel is not returning to what it was before," Altour SVP and chief commercial officer Michael Boult said in a statement.
The forecasts were developed by Avrio Institute, which used "econometric and statistical techniques, including autoregressive integrated moving average" models, using "anonymised business-travel transaction data supplied by Altour with GBTA research and publicly available economic and industry data."
The anonymised Altour transaction data includes prices paid by managed business travellers for air travel, hotel stays and ground transportation, according to the forecast. The forecast did not include the date range the transactions were booked or completed.
While fuel costs have perhaps been the most visible component in rising travel prices, the GBTA-Altour forecast pointed to other factors, including labour. "Travel-sector labour costs continue to rise across every major region, and unlike fuel, most of that increase is written into multi-year contracts and statutory wage floors that do not unwind when energy prices fall," according to the forecast.
Air projections
For 2026, GBTA and Altour project the average global economy ticket price to increase 8.7 per cent year over year to $536 and the average premium-class ticket to increase 9.5 per cent to $4,488. That each class's average fare is projected to increase more sharply on a percentage basis than the 4.7 per cent increase (to $756) of the blended average is due to business traveller class of service downtrading, according to the report.
"Both cabin classes are rising faster than the blended average itself, an indication that ticket mix has shifted toward economy even as fares in every cabin climb," according to the report. "Business travellers are trading down as fares rise and travel managers work to extend constrained travel budgets. If the 2025 mix were held constant, the global blended fare would be closer to $787, not $756."
GBTA didn't immediately provide further detail on that trend, but it's a notable conclusion given the strength in both premium and corporate demand several carriers have reported thus far in 2026. Delta Air Lines, as one example, earlier this month said second-quarter premium corporate sales increased 25 per cent year over year.
Regional lodging impact
GBTA and Altour pointed to disparate regional hotel trends, with the 2026 average daily rate projected to increase 9.5 per cent year over year in Latin America and 5 per cent in the Asia-Pacific region, but 1.5 per cent in North America and flat in Europe, the Middle East and Africa, chalking up the difference in large part to supply variances.
The forecast noted the increased hotel demand spurred by the 2026 FIFA World Cup, as well as "strong group demand, and resilient leisure," with the Middle East conflict, "soft international inbound travel to the US and a weak government segment" as headwinds.
"Corporate and business-transient demand is recovering, but shallowly – rates are rising, but corporate lodging is climbing more slowly than the leisure and group demand carrying the broader market," according to the forecast.
Hotel analytics firm STR seemingly has reached a different conclusion, noting that "recent [US hotel] demand gains are being driven primarily by business and group travel rather than leisure demand," citing that weekday RevPAR through Thursday, a metric held as shorthand for business travel, from mid-May through mid-June accounted for 97 per cent of overall US revenue per available room gains.
The forecast also projects the 2026 global average car rental rate to increase 3.6 per cent year over year to $46.50, then dropping to $46.10 in 2027. That swing, according to the report, is due to normalising fleet costs after a few years of scarcity, and tariffs on imported vehicles that "raise the cost of new fleet – but they also lift the resale value of vehicles operators already own, turning fleet into an appreciating asset."
"Business travel remains a powerful indicator of business confidence. Companies continue to invest in face-to-face connections, customer relationships and growth despite higher costs and greater complexity," said GBTA CEO Suzanne Neufang in a statement. "Business travel may need to weather more uncertainty through this year. In this environment, a well-managed travel programme is essential."