Skyscanner Data Reveals What Made UK Travellers Tick in 2023
New York, Istanbul and Dubai were the most popular holiday destinations for UK travellers in 2023
New York, Istanbul and Dubai were the most popular holiday destinations for UK travellers
- Skyscanner reveals the cheapest flight, hotel stay and car rental destinations from the UK for 2023
- New York, Istanbul and Dubai were the most popular holiday destinations for UK travellers
- From an AI inspired tool, new languages and accessibility improvements to bringing back the much-loved Cheapest Month with new features and introducing true total cost display, Skyscanner has evolved in 2023 to help global travellers find their perfect flight, hotel and car hire
Skyscanner reflects on a year of helping more travellers than ever explore the world and shares a wrap up of how the UK travelled in 2023.
Top spots for UK travellers in 2023
Global travel marketplace Skyscanner reflects on a year of helping more travellers than ever explore the world and shares a wrap up of how the UK travelled in 2023.
New York claims its spot as the most popular destination in 2023. From bagging a bagel and wandering the streets to slurping soup dumplings in Chinatown and scaling Summit One Vanderbilt to soak up the skyline, UK travellers loved to visit the city that never sleeps.
Istanbul was the second most popular destination for UK travellers this year, its celebrated culinary scene turning heads and winning hearts in 2023.
Cheapest flights, hotels & car hire of 2023 revealed
This year, more and more UK travellers opted for alternative, budget-friendly European cities that still deliver on culture and cuisine. According to Skyscanner data, Vigo was the cheapest flight destination of them all with return flights costing just 61/pp on average in 2023. Boasting some of Spains best crowd-free beaches and world-class seafood, not to mention the short 2-hour flight from London, Vigo is the unsung Spanish city offering travellers great value for money. Whats more, as announced in Skyscanners Travel Trends 2024 report, Vigo is the top trending destination for UK travellers in 2024 with the highest year-on-year increase in searches.
As revealed in our infographic, Skyscanner has also identified the cheapest destination to book per month for UK travellers throughout 2023, as well as the cheapest three-star hotel stay and city to hire a car in 2023:
- After analysing prices across thousands of destinations globally, Dengkil in Malaysia is revealed as the cheapest city for a three-star hotel stay, for those travelling from the UK. A mere 20 minutes from Kuala Lumpur, Dengkil offers the best of both worlds affordability and proximity to the lively capital.
- Bucharest comes out on top as the city with the cheapest car hire offering, with UK travellers paying only 13/day on average. Bucharest is an excellent starting point to embark on a Romanian road trip, complete with medieval villages, Gothic castles and the Carpathian Mountains.
Skyscanners trends expert Laura Lindsay shares, Looking back on the year of travel shows how the UK has embraced the freedoms of international travel despite the pinch on purse strings. We see how this traveller behaviour correlates with the emerging trends for 2024. Our latest Travel Trends 2024 report highlights how value will remain a key consideration, but not at the expense of cultural exploration, travellers are simply being savvier with how they travel.
Next year will see UK travellers planning trips to smaller, lesser-known cities, particularly in Europe, with Vigo coming out as the top trending destination for 2024. We also predict Faro in Portugal to be a great-value destination for UK travellers in 2024, with flights having dropped by almost a quarter over the past 12 months.
2024 will also see UK travellers heading abroad to see their favourite artists play, with a third of fans saying they would travel to short-haul destinations to hear their favourite tracks live, while 8% would commit to long-haul travel.