Consumer travel confidence coming back; India tops as most booked country: OYO

Even as travel and hotel industry were the worst affected during the pandemic, OYO said India has topped the chart for the hospitality chain as the most booked country after the unlocking of economy and gradual easing of global restrictions.

India topped the charts for OYO as the most booked country, while Delhi clocked in the most bookings across the world for it in 2020, it said in a report 'OYO Travelopedia 2020'.

The annual year-end travel index, OYO Travelopedia 2020, is an analysis of actual bookings, cancellations, enquiries and searches that took place on the platform of the hospitality chain.

According to the index, while 2020 started on a happy note, with January being the most travelled month, April 2020 witnessed the most number of cancellations across the country owing to government's precautionary lockdown.

With the unlocking of cities, December has emerged as the month which is witnessing the most demand around the holiday season, it said.

The index further revealed that the gradual unlocking strengthened consumer confidence to travel again safely as majority of bookings were for October 2 (Gandhi Jayanti) and Christmas long weekends.

The report said over 8.5 million new user bookings were made on the OYO app and website this year.

In terms of destinations, Puri emerged as India's top pilgrimage destination, followed by Vrindavan, Tirupati, Shirdi and Varanasi, it said.

However, when it came to beach destinations, Goa was the hotspot, followed by Kochi, Vizag and Pondicherry.

Delhi, Bengaluru and Hyderabad ranked as the most popular cities among business travellers, while Jaipur, Goa, Kochi were travellers' favourite domestic leisure hotspots, it stated.

In December, over 17 lakh people checked-in over the weekends, with December 12 weekend seeing the highest number of bookings so far.

High number of bookings are also expected around December 31 as bookings are still coming in, it added.

"The findings of OYO's Travelopedia is a testament that India is ready to travel again, and we at OYO are here along with our partners ready to welcome them again. I can confidently say that we are emerging stronger out of this crisis compared to when we entered it," OYO Hotels and Homes, India and South Asia, CEO Rohit Kapoor said.

"While 2021 will be a new learning in itself, we're hopeful that the changes we have brought in 2020 will set new precedents in the travel and hospitality sector," he added.