We analyzed download trends for the top four most popular travel apps in Australia: Booking.com, Qantas Airways, Airbnb, and Virgin Australia.
Covid has by no means disappeared from the rearview mirror. But, it’s receded far enough that global travel has begun to pick back up. According to The World Tourism Organization (UNWTO), destinations welcomed almost three times as many international tourist arrivals between January and March of 2022 as in the same period of 2021.
However, Australia’s tourism industry was hit a little harder than most. In 2019, the country welcomed some 9.5 million international visitors. In 2020, this number dwindled to just 2.1 million as near-total closures made it practically impossible to visit Australia for leisure. While the country has since opened its gates to fully-vaccinated visitors, the road to recovery remains a steep one.
So, with this in mind, we took a look at the top performing travel apps in Australia. We analyzed Booking.com, Qantas Airways, Airbnb, and Virgin Australia. Here’s what we found.
These are Australia’s top performing travel apps over the last 30 days…
1.Booking.com: Hotels and more by Booking.com Hotels & Vacation Rentals
- 30-day Android Downloads in Australia: 175,853
- 30-day iOS Downloads in Australia: 282,871
Total 30-day Downloads in Australia: 458,724
2. Qantas Airways by Qantas Airways Limited
- 30-day Android Downloads in Australia: 34,874
- 30-day iOS Downloads in Australia: 116,584
Total 30-day Downloads in Australia: 151,458
3. Airbnb by Airbnb
- 30-day Android Downloads in Australia: 24,547
- 30-day iOS Downloads in Australia: 93,864
Total 30-day Downloads in Australia: 118,411
4. Virgin Australia by Virgin Australia Holdings Pty Limited
- 30-day Android Downloads in Australia: 17,105
- 30-day iOS Downloads in Australia: 83,169
Total 30-day Downloads in Australia: 100,276
iOS travel app downloads are really strong…
Above you’ll find daily Australian downloads for the iOS versions of Booking.com (blue), Qantas Airways (red), Airbnb (orange), and Virgin Australia (green). In particular, these are downloads from the period between January 1st and July 11th, 2022.
In total, Australians have downloaded these apps 3,008,197 times since the beginning of 2022.
- Booking.com has 1,552,695 downloads.
- Airbnb has 656,652 downloads.
- Qantas Airways has 449,011 downloads.
- Virgin Australia has 349,839 downloads.
Android downloads lag iOS downloads, but are still solid…
Once again, the chart above depicts daily Australian downloads for the Android versions of Booking.com (blue), Qantas Airways (red), Airbnb (orange), and Virgin Australia (green). It shows downloads from the period between January 1st and July 11th, 2022.
In total, these apps have been downloaded 1,459,149 times in Australia thus far in 2022.
- Booking.com has 1,002,277 downloads.
- Airbnb has 195,694 downloads.
- Qantas Airways has 152,590 downloads.
- Virgin Australia has 108,588 downloads.
Final Thoughts
The top four best performing travel apps in Australia are unsurprising. Booking.com and Airbnb are household names, while Qantas and Virgin are two of the most reputable airlines in Australia. What’s, perhaps, a little more surprising is just how well they’ve performed in Australia throughout the covid era.
Indeed, downloads are strong now, but they were actually stronger last year before the country began to relax travel restrictions. Check it out:
In any event, if the UNWTO’s stats are correct, then it seems like there’s a good deal of pent-up demand for travel. It’ll be interesting to keep an eye on these apps as Australia’s travel and tourism industry continues to recover.
