The company reported revenue of $3.1 billion in Q4, up 10% year over year, driven by a 21% jump in B2B revenue and a 25% increase in advertising revenue as well as growth at all three of its B2C brands – Expedia, Hotels.com and Vrbo. Full year revenue was $13.7 billion, up 7% compared to 2023.
CEO Ariane Gorin, who will mark her one-year anniversary in the position in May, said the company is now focused on using its momentum from 2024 to focus on three priorities for the year ahead.
“First deliver more value for travelers. Second invest where we see the greatest opportunity to drive growth in each part of our business. And third continue driving operating efficiencies and expanding our margins,” she said.
And the company is leaning in to to power each of those efforts. Gorin outlined “three buckets” of strategies related to AI across the company.
The first is using the technology to make its products better for B2B partners and for travelers — ensuring they have a “delightful experience that makes them want to come back” — although she did not provide any update on Expedia’s AI assistant, Romie, which launched last year.
“The second is looking at changing travel behaviors,” Gorin said.
“Travelers are going to start to search in different ways. And so we need to make sure that our brands are showing up in those new places where people are using gen AI native search. And fortunately we’ve got a very tech sophisticated marketing team that is making sure we do show up there.”
The third priority, Gorin said, is to identify “native AI travel startups” that Expedia Group could partner with, for example as a supply partner.
Vrbo and Hotels.com
Speaking about the financial results, Gorin highlighted growth at Vrbo and Hotels.com, coming after a period when both had struggled as a result of the transition to the company's new tech platform.
“When I stepped in as CEO last year, we set an ambition to bring Vrbo and Hotels.com back to growth while extending our strengths in brand Expedia and advertising … I’m proud with how our teams delivered against this call to action,” she said.
Gorin said work on Vrbo’s product, marketing and supply — the company added one million units primarily in urban areas — helped fuel the growth in 2024, and now the company has “some exciting plans coming in 2025 … so we’re going to continue leaning in.”
For Hotels.com, Gorin said it was “pretty meaningfully impacted” by both the tech migration and changes to OneKey, but the company has “big plans on reinvigorating that brand that we’ll see come to life in 2025.”
Regarding OneKey, Gorin said further rollout beyond the United States and United Kingdom is paused as the company assesses what it has learned from how the program has impacted Expedia, Hotels.com and Vrbo. Gorin said is looking “by brand and by geography” to determine what it needs to do regarding loyalty and will share more later this year.
Financial results
Gross bookings in Q4 were $24.4 billion, up 13% year over year, and came in at $111 billion for the full year, up 7%.
Booked room nights grew 12% in Q4 and 9% for the full year, compared to comparable periods in 2023. Lodging gross bookings grew 12% year over year in the quarter to $17 million and within that hotel bookings were up 14%.
B2C revenue was $2 billion and B2B was $1 billion in Q4, up 6% and 21% respectively year over year. For the full year, B2C revenue was $9.3 billion, up 2%, and B2B was $4.1 billion, up 21% compared to 2023.
Adjusted EBITDA was $643 million for Q4 and $2.9 billion for the full year.
Similar to Q3 2024, Gorin said international demand was stronger than in the U.S., with booked room nights growing in the high single digits in the U.S. but the low double digits in Europe and high teens in the rest of the world.
“Our B2B business continues to benefit from this strong international demand, especially in APAC,” Gorin said.
“And in our consumer business, our global expansion efforts continue to show solid progress.”
Expedia Group’s direct sales and marketing expenses were $1.5 billion in Q4, up 13% year over year, and $6.8 billion for the full year, up 12% compared to 2023.
Tags: Expedia, Hotels.com, Ariane Gorin, Vrbo, Expedia Group, artificial intelligence
