The Best Places To Travel In 2025
Never has our obsession with the new in travel been more fervent. A TV show set in a beautiful destination (think The Perfect Couple’s Nantucket location) airs, and people promptly start reaching for their phones to look up flights; some call it the ‘Netflix effect’. Then, there is the potent drip-feed of content we consume on Reels and TikTok, which fills us with dreams of having a private chef in the Hamptons or a Dior beach towel.
From festivals and gigs to restaurants and sporting events, travel in 2025 is likely to become increasingly ‘mission-driven’. Holidays will be pegged to ticketed or limited-run experiences that provide a focal point for the trip, as well as social currency. Of course, for every trend there is a counter-trend: take the recent Virgin Active advert that ridicules wellness fads, inviting fitness fans to ‘leave the cult and join the club’ instead. Biohacking spas and silent retreats may be alluring prospects for some, but others will still choose clubbing in Ibiza and villa holidays with their friends.
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In 2025, travel is going to be about doing everything and being everywhere all at once. Or, at least, trying to. Cultural cues will be absorbed instantaneously, kickstarting our curiosity (bookmark those travel tabs). Paradoxically, we’ll also be seeing a hunger for ‘quiet travel’ in nature and an embracing of the joys of the mundane (think ‘supermarket tourism’) in destinations such as Oslo – a place its own tourism board playfully mocked in a quirky video campaign, whose message of: ‘I wouldn’t come here to be honest. I mean… is it even a city?’ went viral.
By the end of 2024, global air-passenger numbers are expected to reach 9.5 billion. The problem is, most tourists continue to concentrate in the same countries (Italy, Spain and France are the top three), leaving much of the planet unexplored. Here are our picks to book now…
Thailand
The White Lotus’s long-awaited third season, which was filmed in Thailand, is guaranteed to ignite demand for vacations in this Southeast Asian country. The tourism board is already banking on it, predicting 39 million international visitors in 2025, up from 2024’s target of 36 million. Adding to the buzz will be the opening of chic wellness resorts Aman Nai Lert and Six Senses Forestias in Bangkok. Down on the Thai island of Koh Samui, the Beach Samui hotel was recently announced as the first licenced resort in Asia to offer ‘cannabis-integrated therapies’.
Los Angeles
Whatever the result of the US election, everyone will be talking about America in 2025. Leading the way in terms of creativity and progressive politics is Los Angeles, which is already beginning preparations to host the 2028 Olympic Games. Downtown, the expansion of contemporary art museum The Broad will unveil 55,000 sq ft of new performance and gallery space, while the futuristic Lucas Museum of Narrative Art in Exposition Park will open its doors in the coming months. Demonstrating its commitment to UK-US tourism, Virgin Atlantic will unveil a new Clubhouse lounge at LAX airport in early 2025.
Greenland
Welcoming just 141,000 visitors in 2023 (compared with more than 90 million for France – the most-visited country in the world that year, according to the World Travel and Tourism Council), Greenland is definitely flying under the radar, but it offers a similar experience to popular Iceland. In November 2024, a new international airport will open in Nuuk, and Intrepid Travel is debuting a ‘Greenland Expedition’ for the new year, which includes hiking the Lyngmark Glacier on Disko Island (expect the Northern Lights rather than nightclubs).
Galápagos Islands, Ecuador
A volcanic archipelago in the Pacific Ocean, the Galápagos Islands are famous for their giant tortoises and the historical connections to English naturalist Charles Darwin. To better protect the long-term conservation of the islands and the wellbeing of the local communities, the Galápagos National Park has doubled the price of its entry fee from US $100 to US $200 in August 2024, to prevent overtourism (in 2023, it received a little over 329,000 visitors). In early 2025, eco retreat Finch Bay will unveil six new Evolution Suites. The hotel has also installed 364 solar panels – the largest private investment in renewable energy in the Galápagos to date.
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