Desktop still dominates mobile as travelers’ preferred booking platform

Mobile websites and apps have so far failed in their coup to overtake online bookings.

Their rise in popularity and functionality is indisputable, but laptops and desktops are still the preferred platform for booking travel, according to a study by Mobiquity.

Sixty-nine percent of travelers looking to book travel on a laptop or desktop plan on spending more than $500. Compare that to the thirty-three percent of travelers who are planning to spend that amount on a smartphone website and we begin to get an idea of the kind of purchases that travelers will commit to on a mobile device.

Travelers most often use tablets to research travel. Hilton is the most turned to travel brand among tablet owners. Although 45 percent of tablet owners research Hilton on a tablet, only 20 percent use its mobile website and app to actually book.

The same goes for Expedia; 37 percent of tablet users research travel using Expedia, but only ten percent will book.

Mobile experiences influence bookings and branding

The most frequent causes of unsatisfactory tablet experiences are slow load time, complicated search and selection, poor navigation, websites that are not optimized or designed for mobile, and websites that don’t link to loyalty or air mile programs.

The study states that thirty-five percent of travelers who have an unsatisfactory mobile experience with a travel brand are less likely to book again. Conversely, one in four tablet owners that have a good experience researching on tablets will then also book on mobile. Mobiquity; however, is a mobile solutions provider and could easily be skewing the numbers to bolster their business.

The below inforgraphic expands on these statistics and outlines which travel brands are the most popular on mobile: