Is blockchain tourism’s new hope?

Purpose Blockchain is a disruptive technology enabling distributed, encrypted, smart and secure peer-to-peer transactions. The fragmented nature of the tourism industry with a high number of contracts and transactions between several parties has security issues, disputes and delay. Although these motivate the use of blockchain, scholars have barely begun to systematically assess the value proposition of blockchain in the hospitality and tourism industry. The purpose of this paper is to examine the impacts, opportunities and challenges of blockchain in the tourism and hospitality sector. The authors present early use cases of blockchain in the tourism industry. Design/methodology/approach The authors conducted a multiple case-study approach and grounded this study based on the technology acceptance management literature with context-specific variables that are pivotal to the study of this topic. Findings This paper outlines the useful features of blockchain in the tourism industry in seven major streams and raises four future research questions. This review will enable hypotheses to be set out for consumers and producers involved in tourism to uncover potential motives and barriers to embracing blockchain. Research limitations/implications Blockchain is a relatively new technology, and given that all use cases are limited to the proof of concept and have not been fully adopted by the industry, empirical assessment of case studies is not feasible yet. Originality/value As blockchain is becoming more known and used in the tourism industry, there is a need to identify challenges, issues and concerns relevant for this industry moving forward. This paper fulfils this need and provides directions for future research.