Experiences becoming “strategic and financial center” of Tripadvisor Group

Tripadvisor Group reported record revenue in 2024 bolstered by experiences, a category that has been fueling its growth in recent years, with Viator accounting for 46% of the company's total revenue last year up from 33% in 2022. 

Matt Goldberg, CEO of Tripadvisor Group, said the company exited the year with momentum.

“We achieved record revenue, driven by growth in experiences, which is increasingly becoming the strategic and financial center of gravity of the Group, as we build on our leadership position in this large and fast-growing market,” Goldberg said. “Importantly, Tripadvisor, Viator and TheFork each contributed to Group profit this year through a disciplined balance of growth and investment.”

On the company's earnings call with financial analysts Thursday morning Goldberg said he expects experiences' success to continue in 2025.

"This year, we also expect our experiences revenue to be the largest contributor of revenue to the group," he said. "For the first time, this progress is consistent with our strategic vision that the experiences category has become increasingly central to travel planning."

And Goldberg said brand Tripadvisor will hone its experiences offerings.

"We'll focus on accelerating experience growth across Tripadvisor," he said. "We'll build marketing campaigns around the experiences category as we continue to drive awareness among our large and growing base of travelers looking to plan experiences."

Tripadvisor's AI partnership strategy

Earlier this year Tripadvisor moved to partner with artificial intelligence-powered Perplexity to improve trip planning. Not long after, the company served as a public partner during OpenAI’s launch of its “Operator” tool that can book travel.

"We're also exploring the intersection of our differentiated content and AI agents to create a seamless way to discover and book on our platform," Goldberg said. "Our teams are innovating and experimenting to expand our reach through strategic partnerships with select leaders in this dynamic space."

Goldberg said that Tripadvisor's partnership with Perplexity is in place to leverage the company's assets and to consider an "AI-first funnel." And so far, the results seem positive.

"We're connecting with the users that come through that channel to get access to our trusted guidance and an AI powered experience," Goldberg said. "We think it's incremental, and I have to say we're seeing, it's early, but we're seeing that this traffic is high intent, and it can work higher than typical traffic that we get that is free, like this."

With respect to its partnership with OpenAI, Goldberg said Tripadvisor is looking to create a "long-term, durable" position in the AI ecosystem. 

"That is what our partnerships are about," he said. "We're collaborating with OpenAI Operator because we think there's a huge opportunity here, and we think collaborating allows us to be best positioned favorably as agentic AI emerges. We are going to learn and adapt everything we do to participate in that and bring our proprietary supply to the table. And we're really excited about that."

The company will continue to look at deals with a focus on its positioning in the long run as well as traffic, product innovation and monetization as it considers companies to partner with.

Goldberg said Tripadvisor will have more to announce on the matter soon.

Financial results

Fourth quarter revenue was $411 million, marking a 5% rise year over year. Adjusted EBITDA was $73 million for Q4, down 13% year over year. Marketing costs for Q4 were $152 million, a 22% increase year over year.

For the full year, revenue was $1.8 billion, up 3% compared to 2023, which was also a year of record annual revenue. Adjusted EBITDA in 2024 was $339 million, up 1% year over year. Marketing costs for the full year were $729 million, up 3% compared to the prior year.

By segment, results varied.

"For the first time, all three segments positively contributed to group profit, and now more than half of our revenue is coming from our growth marketplaces at Viator and TheFork," Goldberg said. 

Brand Tripadvisor had $204 million in revenue in Q4, a 6% loss year over year. Viator had $186 million in revenue and $840 million in gross booking value in Q4, a 16% and 17% increase respectively.

For the full year, Brand Tripadvisor reported $949 million, an 8% loss year over year, with Viator's revenue inching closer at $840 million for 2024. Viator also reported nearly $4.2 billion in gross bookings value, up nearly 12%. 

“We delivered fourth quarter results that exceeded our expectations ...,” said Mike Noonan, chief financial officer for Tripadvisor Group. “Our 2025 plan reflects a disciplined approach to investment in our key initiatives and resource alignment, which we believe lays the foundation for long-term growth in revenue and profit.”

Goldberg said the company's plan to acquire its parent company Liberty Tripadvisor Holdings for $435 million is still in process and is expected to wrap up in the second quarter of this year.

The company also referenced its fourth quarter restructuring efforts in the earnings release. Tripadvisor said that it initiated moves across its businesses to reduce the cost structure, improve operational efficiency and realign its workforce. In doing so, Tripadvisor was subject to pre-tax restructuring and reorganization costs of $21 million. It expects additional costs between $9 million and $11 million during the first quarter of 2025, with most in the Brand Tripadvisor category.

* This story will be updated following the close of the earnings call.