Airlines lag behind in AI‑agent sales as OTAs gain traffic
The Lufthansa Innovation Hub says airlines are not preparing well for flight search and booking through AI assistants, while online travel agencies are visited more often because they provide machine‑readable data. Most airline websites are not easily accessible for KI agents, and the hub recommends developing NDC and sales through KI agents in parallel.1
Visits from KI sources to travel websites rose 119% in July compared with the previous year, showing strong demand for chat‑based systems, yet KI agents directly called airline sites in only 5% of cases. Sabre’s servers based on the Model Context Protocol allow KI agents to search, book and modify structured airline offers, highlighting a technical path forward for airlines that lag behind.1