Hopper

Market position

Hopper is one of the larger independent online travel marketplaces, reported at a $5 billion valuation in February 2022 and cited among the most downloaded online travel agency apps worldwide in 2022. Its app describes serving more than 70 million travelers, and by late 2021 the company reported more than 64 million downloads and over 180 million trips planned. Its HTS division competes as a supplier of embedded travel commerce to banks and airlines.

Hopper's core differentiator is price prediction built on historical fare data, paired with fintech products that monetize flexibility — price freeze, change and cancellation options, and flight-disruption rebooking — rather than advertising. The company claims average savings of $65 per trip versus other booking sites and licenses the same prediction and fintech capabilities to third parties through HTS.

Technology

Hopper uses machine learning to forecast flight and hotel prices — its app claims 95% accuracy up to a year in advance — and to price its fintech flexibility offers dynamically. The price-forecasting algorithm, based on historical fare data, was designed in 2010 in Cambridge, Massachusetts. During development the company crawled about two billion web pages of travel information into a database. The same stack is packaged for third parties through HTS as white-label booking and fintech APIs.

Go-to-market

Consumer distribution is app-first, through the iOS and Android app stores with price-drop notifications, a color-coded deals calendar, referral-driven "carrot cash" credits and limited-time sales; the Google Play listing shows 10M+ downloads and a 4.7 rating across about 150,000 reviews. On the enterprise side, Hopper sells through HTS partnerships that embed its booking and fintech products into partner-branded channels such as Capital One Travel, Uber UK, Air Canada, Tripadvisor, Commonwealth Bank, Nubank, Lloyds Bank, Virgin Australia, Frontier Airlines and, most recently, RBC.

Leisure travelers booking flights, hotels, short-term home rentals and rental cars via mobile, and, through HTS, enterprise partners including banks, credit card issuers, airlines, ride-hailing and travel-content companies seeking embedded booking and travel fintech capabilities.

Geography

Headquartered in Montreal, Quebec, with a major U.S. office in Boston, Massachusetts, and worldwide service. The company has expanded internationally since 2018, with HTS partners in Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia and Latin America, and it acquired businesses in Colombia (GDX Travel) and France (Smooss).

History

After its 2007 founding, Hopper spent several years in stealth development, raising a $12 million Series B in 2012 from investors including OMERS and Atlas Venture. It launched publicly in January 2014, drew coverage from The New York Times in April 2014 for research reports on cutting travel costs, and pivoted in May 2014 to a data-driven booking-timing model. A mobile app with flight price prediction and real-time price monitoring launched in January 2015, followed by $62 million in funding in March 2016 to improve the airfare prediction algorithm and the addition of hotel booking in 2017. A $100 million investment in October 2018 supported international expansion, and fintech features were added in late 2019, the same year Hopper acquired Colombian travel company GDX Travel and started the Hopper Trees program. A $170 million investment from Capital One in March 2021 gave the company unicorn status, and a $175 million Series G led by GPI Capital followed in August 2021. Hopper acquired PlacePass and Journy in 2021 and Paris-based Smooss in February 2022, launched Hopper Homes for short-term rentals in January 2022, was valued at $5 billion after a $35 million secondary share sale in February 2022, and received $96 million more from Capital One in November 2022. In April 2026 Capital One took in-house the technology and roughly 150 employees that powered Capital One Travel, after which Hopper refocused on its B2B business.

Risks & controversies

In May 2018 Hopper's "Secret Fares" feature, which claimed exclusive access to seats discounted by 35%, drew criticism; Air Canada and WestJet cut ties, saying the fares were falsely marketed as exclusive, and Hopper closed the program. In July 2026 the company agreed to pay US$35 million to settle U.S. Federal Trade Commission allegations that it charged fees without consent and deceived users about fees and benefits of some products, which TechCrunch framed as part of a regulatory crackdown on dark patterns. Customer reviews on Google Play cite unresolved support issues and unwanted notifications. The April 2026 transfer of Capital One Travel technology and about 150 staff to Capital One reduced Hopper's relationship with what had been its flagship client.