Developing a Mobile App for a Travel Agency
A travel agency mobile app is not just a tour showcase. It's an aggregation of offers from multiple suppliers (Amadeus, Sabre, GDS systems, or tour operators directly), search with filtering by dates, resorts, and hotel categories, booking with seat holds, and payment processing. Each of these layers adds complexity, and most projects stall precisely at the supplier integration stage.
Integration with Tour Suppliers
Major international tour operators—TUI, Coral Travel, Anex Tour—provide XML APIs over TourVisor protocol or proprietary WSDL. XML-over-HTTPS with synchronous search requests that may respond in 5–15 seconds. This immediately dictates the architecture: the mobile client makes a request to its backend, which simultaneously queries multiple suppliers, normalizes results, and returns unified JSON.
// Progressive result loading via WebSocket
class SearchViewModel: ObservableObject {
@Published var results: [TourPackage] = []
@Published var isSearching = false
private var webSocketTask: URLSessionWebSocketTask?
func startSearch(params: SearchParams) {
isSearching = true
results = []
// Backend streams results as they arrive from suppliers
webSocketTask = URLSession.shared.webSocketTask(with: searchStreamURL(params))
webSocketTask?.resume()
receiveResults()
}
private func receiveResults() {
webSocketTask?.receive { [weak self] result in
switch result {
case .success(.string(let json)):
if let tour = TourPackage.decode(from: json) {
DispatchQueue.main.async {
self?.results.append(tour)
}
self?.receiveResults()
}
case .success(.data): break
case .failure:
DispatchQueue.main.async { self?.isSearching = false }
@unknown default: break
}
}
}
}
Progressive loading is critical for UX: don't wait for all suppliers to respond; show the first tours within 2–3 seconds.
Search and Filtering
Search by destination, departure dates, number of nights, meal type (AI, UAI, BB), and hotel star rating—standard functionality. More complex is flexible dates: "±3 days from selected date." This multiplies API requests to tour operators. Cache search results on the backend in Redis with 5-minute TTL—identical requests from different devices return cached data, reducing GDS load.
Hotel maps via MapKit (iOS) or Google Maps SDK (Android). Marker clustering via GMSMarkerCluster or MKAnnotationView with clusteringIdentifier—without it, Turkey with 800 hotels turns the map into a mess.
Booking and Payment
After selecting a tour—verify price freshness (GET /tours/{id}/check) and seat availability before payment. Tour prices change in real time; a tour costing 75,000 rubles 2 minutes ago may cost 80,000 now.
Payment via YooKassa or CloudPayments with installment support (Halva, Tinkoff Installments). For expensive tours, installments boost conversion—integrate via POST /payments with parameter payment_method_data.type = installments. After payment—automatically send voucher and flight tickets to email and within the app.
Tourist Account
Travel history, current bookings, document uploads (passport for autofill via ML Kit Document Scanner on Android or VisionKit on iOS). Reminders via FCM/APNs: "3 days to departure—check documents," "Flight delayed 2 hours" (integration with FlightAware or AviationStack API).
Offline access to vouchers and itinerary receipts—Core Data / Room with PDF download in background mode (URLSessionDownloadTask).
Stages and Timeline
API aggregator design → integration with 1–2 tour operators → search and filtering → booking → payment → tourist account → push notifications → iOS + Android.
10–14 weeks for a complete app with tour operator integration, maps, and account management. Pricing is calculated individually after requirements analysis.