At the 2026 TravelDaily Conference, Fliggy CTO Ye Chen outlined a future where AI agents—not human travelers—do the searching, comparing, and booking. In his presentation, “Agentic Commerce and AI-native travel: How far have we come?”, Chen argued that as agents take over these tasks, the industry’s traditional traffic gateways, transaction models, and operating frameworks will undergo fundamental change.
For hoteliers, the most pressing question is no longer about ranking on a search results page. It’s about how a property gets discovered when a traveler delegates the entire planning process to an AI assistant. Traditional search assumes users have a clear idea of what they want, but many travel needs are too nuanced for a few keywords. AI agents change that by letting travelers describe their desires in natural language—then breaking those down into destinations, dates, budgets, and preferences, and assembling a complete itinerary across flights, hotels, ground transport, and experiences.
The shift from choice to delegation
OTAs have long competed on offering more options. AI, Chen suggests, flips that model: instead of presenting a list, the agent makes the choice. That raises a critical question for hotels: why would an AI recommend your property over another?
The answer goes beyond mere visibility. Chen points to several factors that could influence an agent’s decision: real-time inventory accuracy, pricing flexibility, completeness of product information, clarity of cancellation policies, and whether a hotel’s services can be identified and accessed by AI systems. Hotels that fail to make their data machine-readable risk being invisible to the very agents that are booking on behalf of travelers.
Fliggy has already embedded AI into its platform. Its AI-native app, “Fliggy Bangbang,” covers the full journey—from inspiration and itinerary planning to booking and post-trip services. Users can even feed the AI a social media post or a suggested itinerary and ask it to turn that content into a bookable, executable travel plan. This is a clear signal of where the OTA is heading, and it aligns with broader industry moves, such as Trip.Biz embedding AI booking into ByteDance's Doubao Work.
Chen believes AI’s impact will extend beyond simply diverting traffic from OTAs. By lowering the cost of travel decision-making, AI could unlock long-tail demand—needs that were previously too difficult to articulate or never searched for at all. These could now enter the transaction market, expanding the overall pie rather than just redistributing it.
Search itself is not disappearing, Chen argues. The underlying demand may actually grow. For hotels, that means the strategic focus should shift from worrying about traffic gateways to ensuring their product is fully optimized for AI-driven discovery and booking.
This is a theme that resonates across the industry. As AI reshapes travel booking, human advisors remain key, according to leaders at recent forums. The balance between automation and human touch will be critical, especially for complex or high-value trips.
For hoteliers, the takeaway is clear: invest in data hygiene, real-time connectivity, and AI-friendly APIs. Ensure your rates, availability, and policies are not just accurate but structured in a way that AI agents can parse. The hotels that do this well will be the ones that get recommended—not because they paid for placement, but because they made it easy for the agent to say yes.
