I Asked AI to Plan My Trip, Here’s What Happened

I travel a lot, and while I love the thrill of discovering new places, I’ll never say no to a little help planning the perfect itinerary. So when I heard about Airial Travel, an artificial intelligence (AI) travel planner that promises to do all the heavy lifting for you, I had to try it for myself. I decided to test it out on a destination I know like the back of my hand: Salt Lake City. With my go-to hiking trails and favorite fishing spots in mind, I handed over the reins to Airial Travel.

For background, I used to live in Salt Lake City and now visit multiple times a year, so I'm very familiar with the area. This makes it a perfect location to test Airial Travel's technology capabilities—if it could impress me, a former local, then it would pass the sniff test. Here's what happened when I used it to plan an upcoming trip.

1. Describe Your Trip

There are two ways to plan an itinerary with Airial Travel. The first is simply with a link; if you see a destination on Instagram or TikTok, you can pop the link into the interface, and it will give you travel suggestions around what's mentioned. Super cool, right?

The second is to simply describe your trip, like you were using ChatGPT or any other digital assistant. This was the feature I decided to use. I didn't know how detailed I needed to be, so I kept my prompt brief with a few basic need-to-knows any human travel agent would ask IRL: my destination, the time frame I wanted to travel, where I was traveling from, and the key activities (fly fishing and hiking) I wanted to do while I was in town.

I hit "Enter" and was immediately served up a thorough list of options for each of my activities, plus extra suggestions for "Daytrips & Nearby Adventures."

I was immediately impressed by the options Airial Travel provided, which were a mix of well-known rivers and hiking trails combined with lesser-known hidden gems. I appreciated that it suggested other activities to round out the rest of my itinerary (you can only fish and hike so much for a week!). If I were helping a friend plan a trip to the area for their first time, I would genuinely suggest many of these destinations to visit.

After scrolling through the suggestions in each category, I decided to choose three activities to build my itinerary around: a day trip to Park City, fly fishing in the Provo River, and hiking Donut Falls. I selected each and hit "Continue."

2. Choose Flights and Accommodations

Once you have a baseline of the activities you want to do, Airial Travel will help you plan the nitty-gritty details of your trip, like hotels and flights. To do so, I was prompted to provide the city I was traveling in and out of (Newark, New Jersey) and where I'd be for the duration of my stay (Salt Lake City). There are multi-city options, too, which is great. As someone who frequently starts in one location and bounces to others along the way, a multi-city function is incredibly convenient.

From there, Airial populated with flight options and pointed out which ones were cheaper and more direct. Then, it was time for hotels, which I could filter out based on preferences like cost per night, location, amenities, star rating, and more. The whole time, the platform keeps a "Total Cost" tab for flights and lodging running in the upper right-hand corner, making it super easy for budgeting. I selected the Grand America Hotel—a mid-market hotel in downtown SLC—and got to shaping the rest of my itinerary.

3. Finalize Your Itinerary

Arguably, this is the most fun part. Once you hit "Full Itinerary", you'll be served up exactly that—a full itinerary. This is super impressive; Airial Travel built me a schedule for the entire week, including everything from downtime to dining.

It's completely customizable, too. You can click into each of the "blocks" to learn more about the suggestion, edit the time frame you want to schedule it for, or remove it completely.

If you want to replace activities, that's where Airial's AI really comes in handy. For example, say you want to add a vegan restaurant to your dining schedule—all you have to do is ask AI to do that, and it will update it automatically and include other options for you to peruse as well. I wanted to add an extra visit to a local brewery on Wednesday evening, so I simply asked AI to add it in, and it did.

I often travel solo, but if you're traveling with companions or in a large group, you can share your itinerary for collaboration. Similar to a Google Sheet, you can invite collaborators who can help edit the schedule, book flights and rooms, and keep travel details in one spot.

Even more convenient, Airial Travel's AI acts as a concierge or a guide that can answer any question you have about your trip, like what to pack or what the local forecast is. To test it out, I asked it about the fishing license requirements and where to get a license, which it answered in seconds. I even asked it for some packing recommendations and found its responses to be very helpful and informative.

4. Book Your Trip

The last step is to book your trip. Once you're happy with your itinerary, you can book your flights and hotels directly through Airial Travel's interface, so there's no clicking out of tabs or having to copy and paste hyperlinks. Everything can be done directly in the app, saving you time so you can get to adventuring faster.

Final Verdict

Overall, I was genuinely impressed by how seamless and intuitive Airial Travel made the planning process. From curated activity suggestions to real-time budget tracking and customizable itineraries, it felt like having a personal travel assistant at my fingertips. While I went in skeptical—especially since I know Salt Lake City so well—I walked away with a trip I’d actually be excited to take. Whether you're exploring somewhere new or returning to a favorite spot, this kind of smart, stress-free planning is hard to beat. For those times when you want a little extra help (without the back-and-forth of a human travel agent), it’s definitely worth trying.