ITB Asia 2026 opens at the Sands Expo & Convention Centre, Marina Bay Sands, Singapore, on 21 October and runs to 23 October, the show’s 19th year under organiser Messe Berlin Asia Pacific with the Singapore Exhibition & Convention Bureau behind it. MICE Show Asia and Travel Tech Asia 2026 share the halls and the badge, which puts leisure, meetings, corporate and travel-technology buying under one roof for three days. For 2026 the organiser forecasts 18,000 participants, a buyer count above 1,500, 1,000-plus exhibitors and a speaker list past 160.

Last year the floor reached five halls on two levels, two more than in 2024, and 96 tourism boards and convention bureaus took stands. The Singapore Tourism Board has committed to the show until 2028, and the 2027 and 2028 editions are already fixed for 20 to 22 October and 25 to 27 October. This year’s theme is “Experiences in Motion: Human-Centred Design in Travel & Tourism”. “The travel industry is undergoing a profound transformation driven by evolving traveller expectations and rapid technological advancement,” said Darren Seah, Executive Director of Messe Berlin Asia Pacific.

Here is why a hotel, OTA or airline leader books the trip now rather than in October.

1. 60,000 business appointments were made here last year

The 2025 edition set a 2025 record of more than 60,000 business appointments, 35% more than in 2024, out of 18,000 attendees and a buyer count above 1,500, itself 7% higher than the year before. Seah’s line on it: “ITB Asia remains to be the meeting point where the world connects with Asia.” A three-day pass carries up to 33 appointment slots with exhibitors, so a buyer who registers early and fills the diary walks in with a full first day.

2. Travel Tech Asia 2026 adds a hosted buyer programme for CIOs and CTOs

Travel Tech Asia launches a hosted buyer programme in 2026, and it is built for the technology side of the house: roughly 100 CIOs, CTOs and procurement heads drawn from hotel companies, travel agencies and DMCs, TravelMole reported. The exhibitor list already carries Agoda, Trip.com, SiteMinder, RateHawk, DerbySoft, Juniper Travel Technology, Rakuten Travel Xchange, Flywire, Airalo, DragonPass, GoGlobal Travel and China Mobile International. The Hotel Tech cluster has grown for 2026 and now spans reservation systems, CRM, AI tools, design and sustainability, with the hall open from 09:30 to 18:00 each day.

3. Booking.com, KAYAK and Kiwi.com are on the Travel Tech Asia stage

The Travel Tech Asia speaker list so far runs to Laura Houldsworth of Booking.com, Masahiro Yamashita of KAYAK, Oliver Dlouhy of Kiwi.com, Brett Henry of WebBeds, Mehereen Agha Suharwardy of Go City and Michele Ruberl of Travel Token Marketplace. “Technology has become a key driver of innovation and growth across the travel industry,” Seah said. Across the three shows the conference adds up to 170-plus speakers and 4,500-plus minutes of sessions, and any exhibitor, buyer or visitor badge covers all of it. One exhibitor is worth a stop for its newest product: Agoda put an AI assistant that builds a bookable trip from a rough idea into limited public beta on 15 September 2026, according to its press release.

4. A Tripadvisor-built Experience Pavilion debuts

The Experience Pavilion comes out of a memorandum of understanding that Messe Berlin Asia Pacific and Tripadvisor Singapore Pte Ltd signed on 15 October 2025, day one of last year’s show, with Tripadvisor shaping the pavilion’s theme and its content. “We saw over 11 million experiences booked on our sites (including Viator) in the first half of 2025, which is a 15% YoY increase,” said Scott Wegener, Director of Sales (APAC) at Tripadvisor. Around the pavilion sit three Experience Zones, one each for gastronomy, wellness and adventure tourism, and 2026 is the first year the show runs curated guided tours of the floor.

5. The early bird pass is SGD 50 cheaper

The three-day pass to all three shows is SGD 190 early bird, rising to SGD 240 at the listed rate, with 9% GST on top of either. The same pass holds the 33 appointment slots and the full conference programme. Registration is open on the ITB Asia site.

For organisers and prospective speakers: the ITB Asia conference takes proposals through a public “Register as a Speaker” route on its site, separate from exhibitor, buyer and visitor registration.

Key takeaway

A hotel or OTA leader holding a Q4 travel budget should book the SGD 190 pass now and keep all three days, with day one on the Travel Tech Asia stage and the Hotel Tech cluster. Technology buyers at hotel groups, agencies and DMCs should apply for the hosted buyer programme rather than pay their own way. We would leave the Tripadvisor pavilion and the Experience Zones for day two, once the appointment diary has settled.

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