OpenAI is turning ChatGPT into a platform. At its developer conference Monday the company launched apps within ChatGPT—built using a new Apps SDK (software development kit)—and named Expedia and Booking.com among its first partners. The move effectively opens ChatGPT’s 800 million-user base to third-party developers, creating a new distribution channel for travel and a new way to plan and book travel for consumers.
The company said Tripadvisor, Uber and TheFork are set to have apps on the platform soon, too. Additional brands available at launch include Spotify, Figma, Zillow, Coursera and Canva.
“We’re one of the first travel partners with an app in ChatGPT, with our flight and lodging information appearing directly in ChatGPT conversations,” said Ariane Gorin, CEO of Expedia Group, on LinkedIn.
“By bridging the gap between planning in ChatGPT conversations and booking on Expedia, we see enormous potential to create seamless traveler experiences,” Gorin said.
Users will be able to learn about destinations, compare hotel and flight options with real-time pricing and see interactive maps from Expedia within ChatGPT.
Clayton Nelson, VP of strategic partnerships for Expedia Group, said that while traffic from generative AI search is small, it's growing quickly and it's converting to bookings at higher rates than other traffic is.
"Our focus is to meet travelers where they are, and the launch of the Expedia app in ChatGPT is an important step in this strategy," Nelson said, adding that Expedia plans to continue its work with OpenAI to better the travel experience going forward.
Booking.com said the product collaboration with OpenAI builds on the companies' ongoing partnership as they seek to improve the travel experience.
"With this feature, travelers have a new avenue to explore the vast selection of hotels, homes and unique places to stay on our platform," Booking.com said.
"The app generates relevant options for users to browse, with seamless access to our platform to explore further."
Users can type the name of the app within their chat to pull in content from that source. ChatGPT can also suggest an app if it identifies one that is relevant to the chat.
OpenAI said the system is using Model Context Protocol (MCP) to enable ChatGPT to connect to external tools and data.
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Rahul Todkar, head of data and AI for Tripadvisor, said the company is looking forward to deepening its partnership with OpenAI through its upcoming app, which will bring Tripadvisor’s reviews, guidance and AI features into ChatGPT.
“Travelers will be able to ask ChatGPT for personalized, context-aware hotel recommendations and explore an interactive, agentic-first journey that streamlines one of the toughest parts of travel—finding the perfect place to stay,” Todkar said. “Powered by our latest MCP servers and cutting edge gen AI features, this experience blends simplicity with rich decision-making support, making booking easier than ever.”
And the pending partnership is “just the beginning,” according to Todkar.
“In the coming weeks, we'll expand to full end-to-end travel planning, complete with activity discovery and booking," Todkar said.
According to Expedia, the ChatGPT apps are available to logged-in users outside of the EU on Free, Go, Plus and Pro plans.
Travel brands partnering with AI operators
The news comes on the heels of OpenAI competitor Perplexity’s launch of its AI browser and AI assistant Comet, which it announced last week. Expedia Group is also a partner on Perplexity’s launch and is offering an incentive for travelers to download the browser: Silver status in its OneKey rewards program.
Since gen AI came into play, travel brands have been partnering with providers, seeking an edge as travel becomes more intertwined with the technology.
In the spring, Tripadvisor and SelfBook linked with Perplexity to provide hotel booking capabilities. In January, Tripadvisor, Booking.com, Priceline, Uber and Hipcamp collaborated with OpenAI on the launch of Operator. Tripadvisor partnered with Perplexity in January, too, to offer better trip planning.
Industry reactions to new ChatGPT apps
As with any new technology release, the travel industry is reacting.
Ira Vouk, founder and principal of Hospitality 2.0 Consulting, wrote on LinkedIn that “things are happening faster than I'm able to type” with ChatGPT, referencing the “‘chatting with apps’” feature OpenAI released.
“Booking.com and Expedia Group have (of course) been invited to the party. Thankfully, doesn't seem to be working very well yet, so we have a few days to come up with a #directbooking solution for the industry,” Vouk wrote.
Vouk isn’t convinced the addition of chatting with apps means a significant shift of bookings share to online travel agencies (OTAs).
“This use case actually requires the user to type the app name in the chat window,” she wrote.
“This behavior is dependent on the user awareness levels, which is dependent on those companies' advertising budgets. So, this is still NOT the use case that will flip the scale as it doesn't (yet) affect the ***default*** user behavior.”
And Janette Roush, SVP of innovation and chief AI officer for Brand USA, wrote on LinkedIn that the introduction of apps in ChatGPT is “huge” because of the technology they are built on.
“These apps are powered by MCP, an open-source protocol that provides access to the tools that makes your personal AI useful,” Roush wrote.
According to Sanjay Vakil, co-founder and CEO of DirectBooker, those who have worked in hotel distribution knew this kind of change was coming.
"OpenAI’s move into travel will be through aggregators, not individual hotels," Vakil wrote on LinkedIn. "It’s no surprise; that’s how every major integration deal has gone so far. But here’s the kicker: Those aggregators are mostly the same OTAs that already dominate online distribution while taking 15-30% commissions."
These partnerships position OTAs to "become even more powerful," Vakil wrote. "Hotels won’t be able to compete with OTAs on AI integrations, and most won’t even see what’s happening until it’s all over."
Christian Watts, CEO of Magpie, also shared thoughts on LinkedIn, reiterating that it’s hard to keep up with the evolution of AI.
“Last week was Instant Book (Etsy and Shopify—end-to-end shopping without leaving ChatGPT),” Watts wrote. "Yesterday was Apps. It's almost the same thing as PlugIns which was over 2 years ago.”
In his post, Watts said he tried the apps and “couldn’t get Expedia Group to trigger.” However, he said Booking.com worked “reasonably well” but “advanced search fails,” possibly because Booking hasn't giving access to filter data.
“The only problem here is that the experience of booking a hotel on the Booking app is actually pretty optimized already,” he wrote. “Also, it bounces out of ChatGPT to make the booking (for now).”
Watts said he’ll be interested to see whether the integrations lead to the higher surfacing of OTAs in large language model results. In the short term, he said he anticipates success for OTAs.
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