Discussions that shape the future of travel are underway as the world’s largest travel trade show kicks off in Berlin today.

Exhibitors from around the world gather at ITB Berlin where the latest trends and innovations will also be shared.

This year’s event focuses on the changes taking place in travel as the industry and trends in digitalisation and sustainability that tourists continue to embrace.

Berlin plays a vital role in the future of travel

Taking place from 4 to 6 March 2025 at the Berlin Exhibition Grounds, ITB Berlin is both the leading and largest travel fair for the global travel and tourism industry.

Tourism experts and top travel brands will be coming together at the giant convention to showcase the latest developments in adventure tourism, business travel, luxury travel, medical tourism and, increasingly more relevant, travel technology.

Last year, ITB Berlin welcomed 24,000 visitors and a similar number is expected this year. Over 400 industry leaders and experts are expected to speak with 200 varied sessions taking place. The show will be a base for travel industry professionals to network together, stay on top of market trends, and learn from one another, particularly through planned keynotes and panels.

The main theme this year is ‘the power of transition lives here’, as the industry becomes ever more intertwined with evolving traveller preferences (such as the rise in subscription-based travel services), digitalisation, and a need for more conscious and sustainable tourism. Overtourism has become a major issue in recent years, particularly in European hotspots.

Emerging technologies are already transforming global travel experiences, from the trend of hyper-personalisation to data-driven decisions and predictive analytics.

How AI solutions and automation tools will revolutionise and integrate into travellers’ journeys – whether through custom itineraries to more efficient travel booking systems – is expected to be a hot topic.

Tourism boards and leading travel brands are also focusing on creating and executing sustainable marketing strategies. These will also be under scrutiny as rising environmental regulations, and more eco-conscious travellers drive demand for sustainable accommodation, off-the-beaten destinations, and cultural experiences. Diversity and inclusion (DEI) trends will also be addressed to ensure the travel industry can combat bias and provide inclusive experiences.

ITB’s Berlin Transition Lab, will share 20 ‘compact insights’ on the best of the show in just 90 minutes.

Euronews Travel will be hearing the latest news and insider tips from a wealth of already popular and emerging travel destinations, including Kazakhstan, the Philippines, Britain, Azerbaijan, Indonesia, Japan, Saudi Arabia, Dubai, Thailand, Oman, and Albania.

ITB Berlin is often the place where the biggest travel news stories are revealed, so watch this space.

Hoping to get away with less than the full monty on your next trip to Germany? Think again, say officials in the Baltic Sea city of Rostock.

Last week, the city introduced a new regulation allowing beach wardens to ban visitors who refuse to strip down in designated nudist areas.

The measure comes in response to “numerous complaints from people who felt harassed in the naturist areas,” Moritz Naumann from Rostock Tourism told CNN.

However, he emphasized that the rule is only intended to be enforced “in case of conflict.”

While banning clothes at a nudist beach might sound redundant, the decision highlights an ongoing challenge: ensuring that naturist spaces remain comfortable for those who embrace the lifestyle.

Germany’s love affair with nudism is fading

Naturism has deep roots in Germany. FKK or Freikörperkultur (Free Body Culture) dates to the late 19th century. The movement encourages adherents to cast off their clothing and participate in healthy activities to connect with the natural world, promoting a philosophy of body acceptance and harmony with nature.

For many Germans, social nudity has been seen as a normal part of life. Beaches, parks, and even hiking trails have long had designated nude areas in the country.

Today, however, the practice is fading among younger generations.

“The number of people practicing it today is decreasing,” Naumann noted, adding that Rostock has reduced its official naturist beaches from 37 to 27 zones as a result.

What’s acceptable behaviour at a nudist beach?

Anyone curious about naturism should be aware of specific rules and expectations. All body types are welcome and encouraged, but staring, taking photos, and making unsolicited comments are strictly off-limits.

And while designated beaches embrace social nudity, the practice isn’t accepted everywhere. Tourists who have disregarded these boundaries have sparked controversy not just in Germany, but also in Portugal and destinations as far afield asNamibia.

In Rostock, the 15-kilometre coastline is carefully divided into naturist, mixed-use and clothing-only beaches, ensuring that all visitors have a space where they feel comfortable.

But for those stepping onto a designated nudist beach, one rule is now clear: bare all or be prepared to leave.

Did you know that tourism accounts for 10% of the EU’s gross domestic product (GDP), according to the European Parliament? Statista also estimates that revenue for the EU-27 travel and tourism market will hit $220.1 billion (€210.3bn) in 2025.

The rebound in travel following the pandemic has driven much of the sector’s gains in the past few years.

Glenn Fogel, CEO of Booking.com says: “We have just seen such incredible desire to travel. You can actually see it, how much people want to travel because as soon as a country opened up, people would just jump to travel. So we got a big, big boost for the first few years of coming out of Covid. That desire to travel, it never ends.

“Now, of course, the question is, is it going to continue or not? And sometimes people talk about, ‘Well, prices are so high, so will people be able to travel or is there going to be a recession and people won’t have the money to travel?’”

In this episode of The Big Question, Glenn sat down with Angela Barnes to discuss the issues shaping the travel sector: sustainable tourism, overtourism and the wildest future trends.

Balancing sustainability with profitability

With an increased focus on sustainability in the travel sector, travel companies and their partners are facing more hurdles in maintaining profit margins while increasing sustainability options for consumers.

Fogel emphasises: “Sustainability is critical for the future of our industry. Our mission is to make it easier for everybody to experience the world. If the world isn’t worth experiencing, that’s not going to be good for travel.”

Rapidly changing and often overlapping regulations are also posing barriers to profitability in the travel sector, by forcing companies to invest significant time and resources in working out how to adhere to them.

EU regulations such as the Digital Markets Act (DMA) have contributed to higher costs and more cumbersome processes for European companies like Booking.com, unlike other global competitors like Google, which are far bigger and can more efficiently handle overlapping policies as well as rapid regulatory changes.

Other non-EU travel companies, often as big as Booking.com, also don’t have to adhere to EU regulations. That significantly affects Booking.com’s ability to compete with them, while also seeming to “punish” other successful European travel companies and the domestic travel sector as a whole.

Regarding those competitors, Fogel says: “They don’t have their engineers dealing with the regulations. Their engineers are creating better services for their consumers. So my thinking is: Why did we come up with this? We’re going to make things harder for the European companies to compete against the global travel industry.”

How is AI likely to change travel?

Artificial intelligence tools such as Booking.com’s AI trip planner, help travellers with more personalised itineraries, while also providing more customer support.

However, Fogel notes: “What’s more important though, in the future is a thing called agentic AI and that’s an area where the computer is doing the work for you.

So instead of you having to be typing into the browser or the app all the information and going through it, it’s doing it for you.”

Agentic AI is likely to allow the entire travel industry network, from consumer to supplier and the partners in between to coordinate through their own AI agents and plan travel solutions.

This will, unfortunately, be likely to lead to job losses, particularly in the customer service area.

Coming to the future of travel, Fogel said: “But what’s really interesting in the future is not supersonic but hypersonic. And where you actually are going into the edge of space and you’ll be able to do a trip from, say, London to Australia in a fraction of the time it takes now to do that. Now, will it happen or not? Who knows? Part of the issue is sustainability.”

He clarified that hypersonic travel is unlikely to be introduced in the next decade and that Booking.com has no investment in it currently. However, the company would be likely to add it to its inventory if and when tickets for hypersonic travel are available for sale.

Fogel also highlighted that Booking.com will not be providing private jets for ultra luxury travel, saying: “That’s not something that we do and we have no plan to do it. It’s a very, very small segment and it’s not very sustainable.”

The Big Questionis a series from Euronews Business where we sit down with industry leaders and experts to discuss some of the most important topics on today’s agenda.

Watch the video above to see the full discussion with Booking.com CEO, Glenn Fogel.