Multigenerational holidays now a travel trend

Jakarta — Pauline Suharno, chair of the Indonesian Travel Agents Association (Astindo), says that Indonesians have lately preferred holidays in small groups, such as multigenerational families or multi-generation trips. He notes that the trend is for people to holiday in smaller groups with close friends or with their families. Meanwhile, large coach trips are now more often used for study tours or by companies organising trips for employees and distributors.

‘People now prefer to travel in small groups, not in large numbers as in the days when tours involved bus convoys. And there are many multigeneration travellers, so parents, grandparents, children, grandchildren, because they value time together,’ he said after the ANTX 2026 event in Jakarta, on Monday (18 May 2026).

Pauline says the multigenerational travel trend has been evident since Covid-19. The trips are usually funded by financially established parents supporting the trip. This is very common now, he added, not only in Indonesia but worldwide. The trend thus tends to be more relaxed, as people adjust to the rhythms of each generation.

‘The older generation cannot walk late into the night; the children may wake up later, comfortably. For them, holidays are no longer like before when you woke at 6, 7 for breakfast, left the hotel at 8, and rushed back after dinner. Not like that anymore, but more about experiencing their own experiences,’ he said.

Pauline also notes that travellers now tend to choose destinations with cheap, comfortable access to transport easily reached via public transport. Developments in technology and the ease of comfortable, seamless transport make travellers more autonomous when travelling, so the use of travel agents’ services at several destinations is beginning to decline.

He gave the example of holidays to nearby countries such as Singapore or Malaysia, where Indonesians may already be assisted by public transport, online transport apps, and digital navigation like Google Maps. Nevertheless, Pauline believes travel agents still have opportunities to sell packaged trips to destinations with language and payment-system differences.

‘So we sell travel packages where there are language difficulties; travel agent services are still required to run a packaged trip. For example to China, language issues and not knowing how to pay. That market is a big one for Indonesian travel agents,’ he said.