Google is no longer used for travel bookings because few travelers are using it

Google announced at the end of September that it would close its bookings for flights outside the US, and told Skift it would end its US presence after March 31.

Fewer and fewer users were booking flights on Google, which acknowledged that travelers prefer to book their flights through online travel agencies or directly with airlines.

Removing the feature in the same way won’t hurt Google’s case, as it will beat regulatory efforts to reduce its power on antitrust grounds.

With the Google Book for Flights feature, travelers can make reservations on Google, but Google was facilitating the booking for that airline or an online travel agent, and the latter provided customer service. Google wasn’t charging airlines for the feature.

“We plan to phase out Book on Google for flights over the next 12 months,” Google said. “We originally introduced this functionality to give people an easier way to buy tickets and help our partner airlines and OTAs make more bookings. However, over time we’ve found that people want to book directly on partner sites, and we always strive to meet user preferences as much as possible.”

Some researchers saw the company pivoting to become an online travel agency on Google, but that doesn’t seem to be the intention at all. Google makes a lot of money in travel advertising, looking to compete directly with its bigger partners. Google is not interested in processing flight changes and cancellations or providing customer service for stranded passengers.

Google has already ended bookings for hotels on Google in 2022.

Google launched a book in 2015 to help airlines and online travel agencies make bookings easier in an age where many of their mobile sites aren’t particularly sophisticated.

But partners’ mobile capabilities have improved in the interim, and Google says the share of flight bookings coming from the Book Google feature is declining.

Over the years, many Metasearch sites have tried these types of optimized sites for partner airlines and hotels, but with a few exceptions, such as HomeToGo in Germany, this type of feature has been on the decline over the years.