You’ll have read plenty of lists like this elsewhere already. Some choices are baffling.
One authoritative round-up suggested visiting the Scottish Highlands, crowning it ‘Europe’s last great wilderness’. Sadly no word in the article on the fate of the Danube Delta, Caucasus Mountains and Lapland.
Our favourite list included Brazil ‘because it’s making a comeback’ – a surprise to the record-breaking nine million tourists who already went and came back in 2025.
In reality, many of the picks on these lists are featured on a whim. Or, worse, some round-ups are based on which destination or hotel last took the editor on an all-expenses jolly.
We accept no freebies here at Which? Travel, and as you’d expect, we’ve taken a more thoughtful approach to compiling our round-up. All 12 destinations are genuinely better or easier to visit in 2026.
That’s especially true for El Salvador, a country where the only thing that hasn’t changed is people’s perception of it. Other destinations won a spot on our list because of new flight routes. Simply being able to see somewhere new, especially unique destinations such as the Scandinavian Mountains, is often reason enough to book.
Then there are landmark celebrations or openings, such as Giza’s new museum. To plan a holiday around these, they must be truly special. Being able to watch Scotland join the space race emphatically qualifies.
Check our list of Which? Recommended Providers (WRPs) before you book your holiday. They are all excellent companies, rated highly by members, which meet our expert criteria — find out more in our guide to the best holiday companies for holidays in 2026.
Read on to discover the 12 places that truly deserve your attention.
This article first appeared in the January issue of Which? Travel magazine. We don't accept freebies from travel companies, airlines, or hotels, so you can be sure that our investigations, recommendations, and reviews are completely unbiased.
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You’re going to be surprised to hear El Salvador is safer than Argentina and Brazil. So sit down, because I need to tell you that this much maligned Central American state is actually safer than the US too. In fact, crime has been reduced so much that it’s regularly ranked as the safest country in the Americas. It means a visit to this natural paradise of Pacific beach towns, unique volcanic lakes and Mayan ruins is finally possible.
Start on the Ruta de las Flores, which winds through banks bursting with wildflowers and spectacular waterfalls. Drink café con leche at local plantations, eat mangoes straight from trees and swim in hot springs. El Salvador’s blockbuster attraction is Joya de Ceren, a Mayan farming village buried by a volcanic eruption 1,400 years ago. As with Pompeii, it offers an extraordinary window into the past, through preserved buildings like the temazcal (sweat lodge) and ceremonial shaman structures.
Of course, you could ignore all this and just head to beach towns like Los Cobanos for fresh mojarra (deep-fried, seasoned fish) and cocktails at sunset.
It’s unlikely that we’ll make it through 2026 without someone declaring El Salvador the new Costa Rica. But while chain hotels and new flights are arriving, for now you'll mostly have the place to yourself. A trip here isn’t without challenges, although not on your wallet – almost everything costs a dollar or two. Paradise just got a little bit cheaper.
Move over, Cape Canaveral. Many space fans who watched in awe as Neil Armstrong and co were pinged to the moon on the end of makeshift warheads make pilgrimages to Kennedy Space Centre, but from next year you won’t need to cross the Atlantic to find rockets being fired into space.
SaxaVord on Unst in the Shetland Islands will be Europe’s first spaceport, if it wins the race with Andøya in Norway and successfully lifts off a vertical rocket in 2026. The site currently has no facilities for tourists, but that’s unlikely to dissuade those who want to come and watch in wonder after checking into the nearby Baltasound Hotel, the most northerly hotel in the UK.
With Europe’s highest mountain range, the world’s oldest vineyards, Black Sea resorts and Unesco World Heritage cave monasteries, Georgia may be smaller than Scotland, but there’s more to see here than on some continents.
The capital, Tbilisi, has been hailed as one of Europe’s most exciting cities for the best part of a decade - historic, beautiful and with all the energy of a new, independent country. But what makes Georgia so beguiling is just how different it is. The alphabet, the food and the hypnotic polyphonic choral singing are just some of the things that make the culture so distinct, and a visit here so fascinating.
All that’s been missing is the flights, but with both easyJet and BA now flying there directly, you can get to one of Europe’s most remarkable countries for less than £100.
Who, 10 years ago, could have named something that came from Korea that wasn’t a Samsung TV? Now it’s Squid Game on your Netflix or KPop Demon Hunters on your Spotify while picking out your Korean fried chicken on Deliveroo. There have been Nobel Prizes and V&A exhibitions dedicated to Hallyu (the Korean Wave), as Korea has successfully harnessed its pop culture to become a modern cultural superpower.
With fans of K-pop, K-drama and K-fashion driving tourism numbers, Virgin Atlantic will join Asiana and Korean Air in serving the South Korean capital in March, which should see flight fares fall.
Once there, discover how Korean culture stretches back thousands of years in the ornate royal palaces and Buddhist temples. That’s if you can be pulled away from dancing ‘Gangham Style’ at Hongdae's kararaoke bars, feasting on bibimbap and skewered fish cakes, or filling your shopping bags at the space-age, always open DDP plaza.
This 70km stretch along the Thermaic Gulf can’t quite stand up to the beauty of some Greek Islands – but no Greek islands also include a Mountain of the Gods vista. Beaches and resorts here stretch around the feet of Mount Olympus – home of Zeus and innumerable ancient archaeological sites.
The reason Jet2 has launched package holidays here from several UK airports is unlikely to be due to rising interest in Hellenic mythology, but because UK holidaymakers want to dip their toes in the Aegean for less money. Huge demand on many Greek Islands has pushed up holiday prices.
The Olympus Riviera is already popular with Greek and Balkan tourists, so, in places like Olympiaki Akti and Neoi Poroi, you’ll find the stretches of sand, tavernas and bars that you love each summer, but with more local flavour (and local prices).
You don't have to book a package. Thessaloniki Airport has plenty of cheap flights from the UK and you’ll find affordable hotels along the coast.
Want to plan a cheaper trip in 2025? Read 30 ways to save money on holidays.
Given that the Scandinavian Mountain range runs 1,700km, almost the full length of Sweden and Norway, you can only admire the extremely long brass neck of the eponymously named airport in the Swedish Dalarna region, which claims the lot.
It’s been built to address one thing only: snow. Warmer winters mean holidaymakers are paying thousands of pounds for Alpine ski trips in France and Switzerland, to find little more than a muddy mountain.
The northerly latitudes of the Scandinavian Mountains offer more snow, earlier in the season. SAS launched flights in 2024, but with the arrival of both easyJet and Crystal Ski charters in December, the dozens of Alpine resorts with a dash of Swedish magic have become far easier to reach.
Don’t let an airline ruin your holiday. Read our survey to find out the best airlines when planning your 2026 trip.
Nearly a dozen luxury lodges, camps and resorts have opened or are opening this year within sight of the largest waterfall in the world.
Think private pools, swim-up bars and riverside suites where you can watch a bloat of hippos doing a few laps. New regional flight routes and a 24-hour crossing between Zambia and Zimbabwe, which share the falls, are part of the revival of tourism here, but it’s mostly confidence in the stability of Zimbabwe.
Budget-seeking safari explorers can see elephants, crocs, lions and leopards, and daredevils can white-water raft, bungee jump, or take a helicopter ride around the spray of the falls. It’s become easier to book holidays here independently, but if you’re planning a safari or other activities, it’s worth booking with our best-rated adventure tour operators: Exodus, Kuoni and Trailfinders.
The gold standard for museums has been set. After two decades of work, the recently opened Grand Egyptian Museum promises to finally unravel the mystery of the pyramids, which lie nearby. The scale is monumental. One of the grandest treasures among more than 100,000 artefacts and archaeological finds is the entire tomb of Tutankhamun, including his gold sarcophagus.
There’s an 83-ton colossus statue of Pharaoh Ramses II, and a 4,500-year-old Khufu funerary boat which is so well preserved that experts say it could sail today. An unprecedented insight into antiquity that will draw millions of visitors.
Book your tour with a provider you can trust: find one in our guide to the best escorted tour providers.
On July 4, 2026, the United States will celebrate 250 years since it said no to kings and rolled out the Declaration of Independence. As you’d expect, bombastic celebrations are planned in many cities, although you’re likely to have as good a time in some tiny town in the Midwest as you would under the shadow of Independence Hall in Philadelphia, where the Declaration was signed.
If you need to pick a destination, it was Massachusetts that played the pivotal role. In Boston, the colonists tipped tea into the harbour, and the first battles of the Revolutionary War took place in Lexington and Concord. From re-enactments to fireworks, hundreds of events are planned across the state.
It’s farcical, then, that in the year the USA celebrates 250 years since independence, the US government threatens to take away the independence of its northern neighbour, Canada. It might be one of the many reasons that visits to the US by British holidaymakers have slumped.
As Canadians face crunching tariffs from Donald Trump, it’s a good time to take your holiday dollars here instead. Vancouver rivals most US cities for culture, food and excitement, while the national parks offer Arctic tundras, sprawling mountain ranges, log cabins and grizzlies in vast expanses of untouched wilderness.
After an absence of nearly 30 years, the greatest cosmic show on earth is back in Europe – a total solar eclipse on 12 August. Totality will be visible from Greenland and Iceland, but it’s Spain that’s the star of the show.
Cities such as A Coruña, Valencia, Zaragoza and Bilbao, as well as Palma de Mallorca, will be plunged into darkness – and guided viewings and astronomy talks are already being booked up. It will be high summer, and likely unbearably hot, so consider heading to the cooler climes of Asturias for less-sweaty sun watching. Views from the Picos de Europa mountain ranges should be spectacular.
Beach clubs and pushy deck-chair dealers have colonised the beaches of many European countries, so we shouldn’t take it for granted that just about every inch of our coastline is free. That gets even better from next year, when the ribbon is cut on the final sections of the King Charles III England Coast route.
It will circle the entire English shoreline, and include not just the trail itself but access to dunes and the foreshore. Existing paths are included, such as the stunning views over coves, caves and wildflowers of the Lizard Peninsula. However, there are plenty of new routes, too, such as the one through the salt marshes of Deben Estuary in Suffolk, or from Bamburgh (the UK’s best seaside town) to the mudflats of Lindisfarne National Nature Reserve.
