The International Air Transport Association (IATA) today released the results of its 2025 Global Passenger Survey (GPS), confirming that the air travel experience is being rapidly redefined by passengers’ growing reliance on their smartphones and accelerating adoption of biometric-enabled airport processing.
The survey highlights two major trends shaping the future of travel: Mobile Reliance Rising and Biometric Adoption Accelerating.
“Passengers want to manage their travel the same way they manage many other aspects of their lives—on their smartphones and using digital ID. As experience grows with digital processes from booking to baggage claim, the message that travelers are sending in this year’s GPS is clear: they like it, and they want more of it,” said Nick Careen, IATA’s Senior Vice President Operations, Safety and Security.
“However, there is an important caveat, which is the need to continue building trust, so cybersecurity remains a priority. Cybersecurity must be core to the end-to-end digital transformation of how we book, pay, and experience air travel,” added Careen.
The 2025 GPS confirms that the mobile device has become central to the passenger journey, influencing everything from booking to bag drop.
Direct Booking Preference: Over half of travelers (54%) want to deal directly with airlines, driving increased engagement with mobile apps. Airline websites remained the most popular booking channel (31%, down from 37% in 2024), but mobile web apps are gaining ground, preferred by 19% of travelers (up from 16% in 2024). This shift is led by younger travelers (25%), indicating a strengthening trend toward mobile channels.
Digital Payment Shift: While credit and debit cards remain dominant (72%), this marks a significant drop from 79% in 2024. Digital wallet use has increased significantly, rising from 20% in 2024 to 28% in 2025. Instant payment methods, such as IATA Pay, also grew from 6% to 8%.
All-in-One Digital Credential Demand: The vast majority of passengers (78%) want to use a smartphone that combines a digital wallet, digital passport, and loyalty cards to book, pay, and navigate airport processes.
Mobile Bag Tagging: Use of electronic bag tags, which allow passengers to generate their tags via mobile device, is on the rise, increasing from 28% in 2024 to 35% in 2025.
The use of biometrics at the airport is expanding across security and border control, and passenger satisfaction with the technology has reached its highest level yet.
Usage Continues to Grow: Half of passengers (50%) have used biometrics at some point in their airport journey, up from 46% in 2024. Biometric use has risen by nearly 20 percentage points since 2022.
High Satisfaction: Passengers who have used biometrics report high levels of satisfaction, with 85% saying they are happy with the experience.
Willingness to Share Data: 74% of travelers say they would be willing to share their biometric information if it means they can skip showing a passport or boarding pass at airport checkpoints.
Building Trust: Privacy remains a concern, but there is significant potential to mitigate this; 42% of passengers currently unwilling to share their biometric information say they would reconsider if data privacy were assured.
“Passengers are already using biometrics for different stages of their journey, from check-in to boarding. But to make the international travel experience fully digital, governments need to start issuing digital passports and enable their secure recognition across borders,” Careen concluded. “When that becomes common practice, travelers, governments, and airlines will all see the benefits of digital identity with an experience that is even more convenient, efficient, and secure.”
