Many of us were lucky or blessed enough to have gone on vacations when we were kids. Whether it was with our own families or with the families of our best friends, these vacations usually followed the same sort of formula. Option 1: a beach holiday featuring lots of picnic food and cold cuts and sharing rooms between cousins and siblings, all packed into what was probably too little space. Option 2: a ski holiday featuring lots of Swiss Miss packet hot chocolate and sharing rooms between cousins and siblings, all packed into what was probably too little space. Now we are NOT coming for these vacations: they were core memory-forming, late-night laughing, sunburn soothing, board game playing stretches of time that help shape us as people: gifts to us from our parents. That said, travel has changed a lot since we were all kids in our water wings!
Entertainment-based travel isn’t a new idea, but it has shifted to take precedence in many people’s travel planning in 2026. Destinations matter, yes, but more important are the entertaining experiences you can engage in at each location. We’re taking a closer look at entertainment-driven travel and why many vacationers are choosing this experience over more traditional vacations.
Why People Love Entertainment-Driven Travel
1. Experiences Over “Just Taking It Easy”
Whether it’s by design or not, modern life is a busy affair. Wanting to relax on a vacation is perfectly reasonable, but why travel to do that…you can do that in the comfort of your own home! When you travel, the experiences that you have are going to make or break your trip… which is one of the reasons that entertainment-based travel is now so popular. We’re not just talking about sightseeing here, but engaging with the things, places, and people around you to have experiences that are worthy of lifelong memories.
Begin your entertainment or experiences-focused trip with travel that gives you the chance to experience the best in hospitality: a private jet charter flight. Take an active approach to your trip rather than a passive one by planning experiences ahead of time and filling your days with surprising, adventurous, luxurious, and enriching encounters.
2. Events as Trip Motivation
More travel is now being based around a key event as a motivator. Take festivals like Coachella in the US and Download in the UK as an example. While visitors from out of state or foreign countries may stay on in the areas where these festivals are held after the fact, their primary motivation for taking time off, crafting a vacation budget, and being in the air for hours is to see and take part in a specific event. No one would be traveling halfway across the world to see an empty grass field where Coachella was or will be! Chinese New Year, the Japanese Cherryblossom Festival, and Bastille Day are examples of cultural events that certainly warrant the travel time as they are surrounded by food, fashion and festivities as well as the events themselves.
3. Social Media Has Fuelled Demand
Whether this is a positive or negative isn’t for anyone other than the trip taker to say, but the fact is that social media platforms such as TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube have been a real factor in the increase in travel to certain destinations or to experience certain things. Influencers posting their travel and lifestyle content do actually have influence, and it’s shaping decisions made by certain age demographics about travel. Look up “the most Instagrammable destinations,” and you’ll see a curated selection of aesthetically pleasing places: restaurants, certain street corners, national parks, you name it. The experience of visiting these influencer-approved destinations to eat at the same restaurants or take a photo in the same place, to go to the same cultural workshop or theater performance, or to browse the same shelves as those influencers IS the goal. With younger travelers driving a large part of the travel sector, it’s no surprise that this is a real factor.
4. Memories Over Souvenirs
Remember those little velvet-lined jewellery boxes all covered in shells that you brought back home from beach holidays? Or the silly t-shirts or the vial of sand from the beach you enjoyed? Do you still have them, and if you do, are they in any fit state to display? Fewer and fewer people are ditching the souvenirs and opting to put that money into experiences that will help them create memories they’ll have forever. Travel spending on cultural experiences (everything from nightclubbing to First Nations culture workshops to skydiving) is through the roof globally, further supporting the argument that entertainment rather than destination is king in 2025.
Your Holiday Should Suit You
Experience and entertainment-driven vacation escapes are the new black, as travel goes, and they are here to stay. Enriching your lives with rewarding experiences and bucket list adventures helps make these vacations something worth budgeting for. It makes memories that will last long after snowglobes have broken and beanies have ripped and run. Plan your next vacation around a particular event or experiences and find out if this kind of vacation is for you.