Navan Business Travel Benchmark Sets New Record As Business Travel Outpaces Leisure

Navan (NASDAQ: NAVN), the global AI-powered business travel and expense platform, today released its latest Navan Business Travel Benchmark (BTB) for the first half of 2026.* The data reveals a continued widening in the gap between the business and consumer travel economies. Business travel grew 13.5% year-over-year (YoY), while broader leisure travel remained essentially flat as data from the TSA rose 0.5% during the same period.**

“Travel is highly seasonal but the divergence between business and leisure in the first half of this year was more pronounced than we’ve seen,” said Aurélien Nolf, Chief Financial Officer at Navan. “Even as broader travel plateaued, businesses kept investing in face-to-face interactions because of its essential role in driving growth, serving customers, and building teams. In line with our expectations, the BTB grew by 13.5% year-over-year as corporate travel remained strong and resilient.”

The Gap Between Business and Leisure Travel Reaches New All-Time High

Key Trends from the First Half of 2026:

Business and consumer travel decouple.

• The Navan BTB grew 13.5% YoY in H1 2026 to its highest level ever (189.1), widening the gap with the TSA Passenger Index (121.1) to 68 points, an all-time high.
• Since its inception in H1 2023, the Navan BTB has grown by 63.6% while the TSA Passenger Index has increased by 7.2% during the same time period.

Despite higher costs, companies leveraged travel significantly more.

• Domestic spend grew 21.5% YoY while volume increased 8.8% YoY as customers increased their rate of travel to get people where they needed to be.
• Hotel booking volume increased domestically by 11.1% YoY and international hotel booking volume grew by 9.8% YoY.
• Domestic average ticket prices (ATP) across all cabins increased 14.4% YoY. International average ticket prices rose 9.1% YoY.
• Travelers increasingly turned to premium cabin classes. The volume of business and first class trips grew domestically by 17.0% YoY and internationally by 19.3% YoY, and significantly outpaced travel across all cabins.

Professional Services grew the fastest across all industries.

• Professional Services led all sectors with the highest growth rate of 44.6%.
• Government & Public Sector followed at 28.5% YoY.
• Transportation & Logistics (27.8%), Energy & Utilities (26.2%) and Non-profit Organizations (22.9%) rounded out the top five.

Ground transportation outpaces broader travel growth, while one expense category plunged.

• Taxi & Rideshare and Public Transport, Tolls, & Parking led all categories in the first half of 2026, posting 23.7% and 19.8% YoY increases respectively, as employees increasingly relied on ground transport to get to meetings and events.
• Internet access declined by 29.4% YoY, driven by a continued industry shift toward complimentary inflight Wi-Fi.

“Our partnership with Navan delivers a rigorous, data-backed view on travel’s role as a key economic indicator,” said Phil Mackintosh, Chief Economist, Nasdaq. “The latest benchmark shows that companies are continuing to invest in reaching new markets to drive growth and are absorbing higher costs as a sign of confidence that business will keep moving.”

See the full report and learn about trends in business travel here: navan.com/btb.

Data and Methodology

*First half year-over-year data results represent Q1-Q2 2026 (Jan 1 – June 30, 2026) compared to Q1-Q2 2025 (Jan 1 – June 30, 2025).

**The Business Travel Benchmark is compared against an index of publicly-available TSA passenger volume data and constructed with the same methodology as the BTB.