Once upon a time there was an obligatory holiday. The one in which the name of the destination was worth almost more than the holiday itself, the beach became a status symbol, the restaurant had to be booked months in advance and the beach was measured in square centimeters conquered at dawn. Once upon a time, the Italian summer was a mass ritual, with the same queues, the same umbrellas, the same places to photograph and talk about. Then something cracked. Not the desire for the sea, which remains very strong. But the way to look for it, live it, imagine it.
Summer 2026, at least according to Airbnb data, tells of a familiar but different Italy. A country that does not give up the coast, the sand, the house with the large table, the children running free and the evening that lengthens without haste. But it is starting to turn its back on the holiday that is too full, too expensive, too performative. Less crowds, slower pace, alternative destinations. No longer as a plan B, but as a clear choice.
The general data is already a signal: Airbnb records an increase in 14% in Italians’ domestic stays ahead of the summer months compared to last year. Italy therefore remains in the sights of Italians. But not always the most obvious one. It stands out among the most searched destinations Saint Theodorein the province of Sassari, which confirms itself as one of the most desired seaside destinations of the season with an increase of 163% in searches. The Sardinian sea continues to be a magnet. However, the real news is elsewhere: in the localities that are growing at an impressive speed because they intercept a new collective need.
The revenge of alternative destinations
Airbnb calls them dupe destinations: destinations chosen as an alternative to the more famous names, capable of offering similar experiences in less inflated contexts. Translated: places where there is the sea, beauty too, but without the impression of participating in a summer survival competition.
The most sensational growth concerns Saint Vincentin Tuscany, which recorded an increase of 545% in research. A location that becomes a family-friendly alternative to Versilia, maintaining the charm of the Tuscan coast but with a softer, more manageable, less shouty idea of a holiday. Soon after he arrives Bellaria-Igea Marinain Emilia-Romagna, with an increase of 540%: the Romagna Riviera without the permanent adrenaline of Rimini, with the convenience of the nearby sea, simple walks, the still recognizable family dimension. In Puglia, however, it grows Greetingswith a +340%for those looking for Salento without being trapped in its more crowded and glossy version.
In short, the Italian family is not running away from the sea. He’s running away from his caricature. From the beach to an event. From the holiday transformed into an agenda. From the journey that promises relaxation and delivers tiredness.
Sarzana: «Families choose more consciously»
Looking at the numbers, the change of pace is not just geographical. It’s cultural. This is explained by Matteo Sarzana, Airbnb Country Manager for Italy, according to whom the growth of locations such as San Vincenzo, Bellaria-Igea Marina and Salve tells “something very precise about how the way in which Italians think about summer holidays is changing, especially for families”.
The sea, underlines Sarzana, “remains an indispensable desire for almost one in two Italians”, but the way in which people want to experience it has changed. Emerging destinations offer “beautiful beaches, slow pace and authentic atmospheres”. Not just backdrops and establishments, therefore, but a different management of time. “What families are looking for is a space where the holiday is truly a holiday, a place where children can move freely and where the destination can be experienced, not just visited.”
This is perhaps the heart of the trend. Live, don’t visit. Stay, don’t consume. Stop, don’t collect photographic evidence. The Italian holiday seems to return to an older and more contemporary form: the holiday as a suspension, as a mental territory even before a geographical one.
Sarzana also clarifies a decisive point: choosing less inflated destinations “is no longer the prerogative of more experienced travellers”, but “has become a widespread strategy”. Families, he adds, “are not settling for a cheap alternative, but are choosing more consciously”.
It’s not just about saving
Naturally the economic factor weighs heavily. It would be naive to pretend otherwise, in a summer in which the family budget remains a central variable and every choice is carefully calibrated. But reducing the phenomenon to convenience alone would be a mistake. For Airbnb, the main driver is not savings, but the quality of the experience.
«The two factors coexist, but the main driver is the quality of the experience, not the savings», explains Sarzana. «Of course, the question of budget is certainly an important factor and a lesser-known destination often means more accessible prices. But if the driving force was only saving, we would see different choices.”
What emerges, however, is an active search for authenticity. Almost one in two Italians consider holidays an opportunity to come into contact with experiences, places and traditions in a genuine way. Not brochure authenticity, not the village transformed into a backdrop for influencers, but a more concrete dimension: the house, the market, the beach reached without stress, lunch without dress code, in the evening without traffic.
In this sense, the success of the Airbnb initiative is significant “On holiday, for real”a week of total disconnection from screens in a seventeenth-century farmhouse in Salento, offered to a family and a group of friends. The nominations were 8,600. A number which, according to Sarzana, “went beyond expectations” and shows “how deep the desire of Italians is to rediscover a time that is truly theirs, far from the smartphone and the frenetic pace of everyday life”.
The real new frontier of summer luxury, then, is not displayed exclusivity. It’s silence. It’s the phone that’s turned off. It’s the possibility of not having to prove anything.
The new Italian holiday resort
The trend doesn’t appear to be a fleeting flare-up. Airbnb reads data as part of a deeper, more structural change. The +14% in Italians’ domestic stays for the summer of 2026 does not appear as a seasonal anomaly, but as the piece of a journey that has already begun.
«Everything we see leads us to conclude that we are faced with a structural change, not a seasonal fluctuation», says Sarzana. «The +14% in domestic stays by Italians this summer is not an isolated figure: it is part of a coherent trajectory that we have been observing for some time on Airbnb. The Italians have rediscovered the Italy of the villages and the hinterland and do not intend to go back.”
The phrase is interesting because it moves the story beyond the sea. Families choose the coast, but more and more often they want it connected to a hinterland, to a village, to a slower landscape. The holiday is no longer just a beach resort, aperitif and dinner. It becomes a house in the woods, a trullo with a view, a villa among the palm trees, a swimming pool in front of nature, an apartment a hundred meters from the sea but in a quiet area, a Mediterranean refuge far from the more canonical Costa Smeralda.
There is Sasso Pisano, an alternative to Saturnia between relaxation, swimming pool and nature. There is Castagneto Carducci, a refuge in the woods on the Etruscan Coast. There is Bellaria-Igea Marina, comfortable and familiar a stone’s throw from the sea. There is Castrignano del Capo, with the charm of Salento stone architecture. There is Ricadi, among palm trees and sunsets over Capo Vaticano. There is Santa Domenica, near the magnetic Tropea but in a quieter dimension. There is Cuili Murvoni, in Sardinia, a Mediterranean refuge between swimming pool, shaded porch and nature, far from the most obvious idea of the Costa Smeralda.
They are places that do not ask to be conquered. They ask to be lived in for a few days.
The big house, the time together, the return of the group
Inside this new way of traveling there is also another key word: sharing. Not in the digital sense, which is now worn out, but in the physical one. Stay in the same place. Cook together. Have common spaces. Putting children, friends, grandparents or multiple families under the same roof without turning every moment into logistics.
Sarzana speaks openly of a cultural change that concerns “the very meaning of the holiday”. More and more Italians, he explains, understand it “as quality time to really spend together”. The idea of a holiday is back in fashion “in a contemporary form” and does not only concern the more mature generations. It also grows among families with small children and among groups of friends.
The data confirms it: on Airbnb, beyond six out of ten bookings in Italy they already concern shared stays today. People leave together and look for houses big enough to stay together. It’s not a real estate detail, it’s a social signal. After years in which travel was often described as an individual, performative, almost competitive experience, the desire for a more collective holiday returns.
The home becomes the opposite of the impersonal hotel and the opposite of the crowded destination: a private space within a desired landscape. Not necessarily luxurious, but big enough to hold real relationships. The swimming pool, the garden, the barbecue, the terrace, the porch: simple, almost archetypal elements, which become central again because they respond to a primary need. Feel good without having to go out.
The least Instagrammable and most desired summer
The paradox of summer 2026 is that the most interesting destinations could be precisely those least obsessed with their own image. San Vincenzo instead of the more iconic Versilia. Bellaria-Igea Marina instead of the more frenetic Rimini. Hello instead of Salento already saturated with symbols. Capo Vaticano and Santa Domenica to experience Calabria without just chasing the postcard of Tropea. Southern Sardinia instead of the more codified Costa Smeralda.
It is not an escape from beauty. It’s an escape from the overcrowding of beauty. From that sensation whereby every place, as soon as it becomes desirable, risks becoming unlivable. Italian families seem to have understood it before many observers: a successful holiday is not the one that makes the most noise, but the one that gives back time.
And this is perhaps why the concept of alternative destination no longer sounds like a fallback. It sounds like a small form of collective intelligence. After years of obligatory and chased destinations on the same horizon, the Italian summer rediscovers its lateral geography: villages, less crowded coasts, houses surrounded by greenery, nearby but not besieged beaches, places where you can still arrive without already feeling late.
The holiday, in the end, returns to being what it promised to be: a time removed from the frenzy. Not a performance to be exhibited, but a respite to be inhabited. And in the Italy of 2026, for many families, the real privilege is no longer saying “I have been to the most famous place”. It’s being able to finally say “I had a good time”.
