It looks like the ideal travel assistant. Type in a destination and a few dates, and within seconds there is a polished itinerary covering where to eat, how to get from the airport, and what time the museum opens.
The trouble is that much of it may be wrong.
A new survey of American travelers has found that more than a third have been given incorrect information by AI while planning or managing a trip. For a sizable minority, those mistakes have cost real money.
One in Three Travelers Has Been Given Bad Information
The survey was carried out by luggage shipping company Send My Bag, which questioned 1,000 US travelers in September 2026. It found that 35.3 percent had received incorrect information from an AI tool while organizing a trip.
The errors were not trivial. The most common was wrong directions or location details, reported by 18.1 percent of respondents. Next came incorrect opening hours for restaurants, museums and attractions, at 14.3 percent.
The most worrying finding may be that 10.4 percent were given the wrong departure or arrival times. Travelers also reported being given inaccurate hotel, airport and baggage information.
The Cost of Trusting the Machine
Bad information quickly becomes expensive information. According to the survey, 16.2 percent of travelers said they had lost money because they trusted AI while planning or managing a trip.
Most of those losses were $250 or less. Some travelers, however, said AI mistakes had cost them more than $1,000.
It is easy to see how that happens. A wrong flight time can mean a missed departure and a last-minute replacement ticket at holiday prices. A restaurant listed as open can turn out to have closed months earlier, which means an expensive taxi across a foreign city for nothing. A hotel described as walking distance from the station can turn out to be a 40-minute drive away.
Millions Are Already Using It
These findings arrive as AI travel planning goes mainstream. Booking platform Hopper reports that a record 33 percent of adult travelers are now using AI tools such as ChatGPT, Gemini and Claude to research, compare and plan trips.
Some are going much further than research. The Send My Bag survey found that 10.7 percent of travelers had let AI plan an entire trip without reviewing the itinerary, and said they would happily do it again. Another 4.8 percent had tried it and would not repeat the experience.
At the other end of the scale, 43 percent of respondents said they had never tried it and were not willing to.
Why AI Gets Travel Wrong
AI chatbots are built to produce answers that sound confident and complete. They are not built to know whether a bistro closed last spring, or whether an airline changed its schedule last week.
Many tools draw on information that may be months or years out of date. When they don’t have an answer, some will generate a plausible one anyway, and there is often nothing in the reply to tell the user which parts are reliable and which are guesswork.
For travel, where schedules, prices and rules change constantly, that is a dangerous combination. Entry requirements are a good example. Europe’s long-delayed ETIAS travel permit has had its launch date moved repeatedly, and an outdated answer could send a traveler to a fake application website or leave them unprepared at the border.
Before You Panic: What the Survey Does and Doesn’t Show
This survey was commissioned by a commercial luggage company, not an independent research body. It does not break down results by age, so it is not possible to say whether older travelers are more or less likely to be caught out.
It also does not show that AI is useless for travel. Used as a starting point for ideas, these tools can save hours of research. The problems in the survey come from treating AI answers as final, not from using AI at all.
How to Use AI Without Getting Burned
Travelers who want the convenience without the risk can follow a few simple rules:
- Treat every AI itinerary as a first draft. Use it for ideas and structure, then verify the details before you book or pay for anything.
- Check flight times with the airline directly. Never rely on a chatbot for departure or arrival times. Use the airline’s app or website, and check again 24 hours before you fly.
- Confirm opening hours at the source. Look at the official website or call ahead, especially for restaurants, museums and anything seasonal. Hours in Europe often change between summer and winter.
- Verify entry rules with official government sites. For visas, travel permits and passport validity, use the State Department or the destination country’s official portal only.
- Map the distances yourself. Before booking a hotel described as “close” to anything, check the walking or driving time on a mapping app.
- Ask the AI where its information comes from. If it cannot point to a source, or the source is years old, assume the answer needs checking.
- Keep receipts and booking confirmations. If something goes wrong, your travel insurance or credit card protection will depend on documentation, not on what a chatbot said.
The Bottom Line
AI can make planning a trip faster and more inspiring, but it cannot yet be trusted with the details that matter most. With more than a third of travelers already receiving bad information and one in six losing money, the most valuable travel skill in 2026 may be knowing when to double-check.
Source: Send My Bag Travel Trends Survey, September 2026, with additional data from Hopper’s 2026 Holiday Travel Index as reported by Fox 7 Austin.
Amanda O’Brien is the creator and editor of The Boutique Adventurer. She has visited 80 countries and is a member of the British Guild of Travel Writers as well as the IFTWTA. She is passionate about wine had has just completed Level 3 of the WSET. Born in Australia, she lives in London.