AAP Finance

Demand for travel remains resilient: Flight Centre

Feb 25, 2026

People walk past a Flight Centre store in Melbourne — Flight Centre handled a record $12.5 billion in travel bookings in the first half, the group says. -AAP Image

Australia's largest travel agent is off to a solid start as it takes off towards its year-end after seeing a shift to cheaper destinations before Christmas.

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Flight Centre's first-half interim net profit came in at $60.5 million, flat from a year ago, while its underlying pre-tax profit rose four per cent to $125 million for the six months ending in December, which was better than expected.

Managing director Graham Turner said the group faced a challenging global trading climate, but still managed to handle a record $12.5 billion in travel bookings.

"As we enter this peak trading period, the second half, we believe we're pretty well placed for the full financial year," he told an earnings briefing on Wednesday.

January delivered record profit for its leisure business, he said.

The first-half result was notable for a shift to more affordable international destinations, with cruising continuing to be especially popular.

The consumer-oriented leisure division also had a solid year, with transaction value growing 10 per cent to $6 billion over the year.

The average customer age for this segment was 56 years for in-store and 45 years online.

For the corporate market, total transaction value was tracking about 150 per cent ahead of pre-COVID levels in 2019.

The division is on the way to beating $5 billion in value for the year.

Flight Centre restated its guidance for a higher full-year underlying pre-tax profit of $315 million to $350 million.

"Demand remains resilient," Mr Turner said, particularly in the corporate and leisure travel segments.

Flight Centre noted that its profit tended to skew 38 per cent in the first and 62 per cent in the second.

Flight Centre is also ramping up the rollout of artificial intelligence across its business, using capabilities it claims its "competitors cannot replicate".

In the leisure business, for example, it has launched an AI-powered consulting tool to streamline research and quote preparation.

This saves consultants up to 30 minutes per traveller itinerary as it can instantly surface appropriate hotels, activities, flights and guides.

RBC Capital Markets analyst Wei-Weng Chen said Flight Centre's first-half revenue and pre-tax profit both exceeded expectations and it was "off to a good start" for the second half.

Flight Centre shares on the ASX were down 3.5 per cent to $12.82 late Wednesday afternoon.