Do you sell tours, attraction tickets or event tickets?
Google Ads just gave you a new campaign type to test.
On July 8, 2026, Google announced that its Search campaigns for Travel beta now covers two new verticals: Things to Do and Events.
Here’s what changed and how to test it properly.
What’s changed?
Quick backstory.
In May 2026, Google launched Search campaigns for Travel at Google Marketing Live.
It bundles the travel ad formats (Travel Promotion Ads, Booking Links and travel feeds) into one Search campaign type, powered by AI Max.
One campaign. One budget. One view of performance.
No more juggling separate formats and splitting budgets between them.
At launch, it was built for traditional travel advertisers (think hotels and flights).
Now Google has extended the beta to Things to Do and Events.
That covers attractions, guided tours, experiences and event tickets.
It’s an open beta, but availability is limited.
Google hasn’t published eligibility rules yet.
Why Google picked these verticals
Think about what selling tour spots or event tickets actually looks like.
Prices change. Availability changes daily. And every purchase is tied to a specific date and place.
That’s exactly how hotel rooms and flights work. Which is why Google built automated travel campaigns for them in the first place.
Until now though, if you sold tours or tickets, you had two options: standard Search campaigns or Performance Max.
Neither was designed for date-based, availability-driven inventory.
This campaign type is.
What you get
Because it runs inside Search campaigns, you get tools the old travel formats missed out on
Full Search bidding suite: Including true target ROAS across all your travel assets.
Keyword and search term reporting: See exactly what people searched before they clicked.
Data-driven attribution: Plus a single performance view across the whole results page.
What’s still unknown
Google announced this in a five-post thread on X.
Not a full blog post.
So plenty of details are missing: eligibility criteria, which countries can use it, feed requirements, and which bidding and reporting features apply to the new verticals.
Expect things to change during the beta.
How to approach it
Don’t rip up your existing campaigns.
Here’s the smarter play:
Check your Google Ads account (or ask your agency) to see if the beta is available to you
Set aside a small test budget
Run it alongside your current Search and Performance Max campaigns
Compare bookings and ticket sales, not just clicks
If the numbers beat your existing mix, scale it. If not, you’ve lost nothing.
Our take
Tourism and events businesses have spent years advertising date-based inventory with generic campaign tools.
This is Google admitting that gap exists.
The beta is limited, details are thin, and features will shift.
But if you sell tours, experiences or tickets, getting in early means you learn the format while your competitors wait for the official rollout.
Want to know if your business is eligible, or need help structuring the test?
Talk to the DNHQ team.
