Uber expands its summer seaside offering: Uber Boat returns to European shores, including Croatia
At the GO–GET 2026 event in New York, Uber announced a new phase of expanding its app beyond classic transportation and food delivery, with an emphasis on travel, accommodation and destination services. Among the most important news for the European market is the return of the Uber Boat service, which from June 2026 will enable users to rent vessels in Portugal, Spain, Italy, France and Croatia. This is a continuation of Uber’s strategy according to which the app no longer serves only for ordering rides in the city, but becomes an entry point for a broader tourist experience: from arrival at the airport and transportation to the hotel, through accommodation booking, to food, supplies and experiences on the water. The company is thereby entering a space in which mobility, digital travel and the experience economy increasingly overlap, especially in tourist regions where seasonal demand is concentrated around the sea, the coast and short holidays.
Vessel rental through the app from June 2026
According to Uber’s announcement, Uber Boat will be offered this summer in five European countries: Portugal, Spain, Italy, France and Croatia. The service is being developed in cooperation with the Click&Boat platform, specialized in vessel rental, through which users will gain access to a fleet of approximately 50,000 boats. Uber is therefore not building its own fleet, but is introducing a partner model of vessel booking into its app, bringing the user experience closer to the way rides, food or other services are already ordered within the same digital platform. For users, this means a simpler path to booking, and for Uber an expansion toward the segment of tourist services in which decisions are often made quickly, on mobile and at the destination itself.
In the announcements, the Balearic Islands, the French Riviera, the Amalfi Coast, Portugal and the Croatian coast are mentioned as examples of attractive European destinations. In that context, Croatia fits into the broader Mediterranean pattern of seasonal demand for nautical experiences, excursions and private or semi-private sailings. Croatia’s official tourist promotion highlights 1,244 islands, islets and reefs, which makes the coast particularly suitable for services that rely on the sea, short excursions and flexible planning. However, details about available ports, specific routes, prices and rental conditions in Croatia are not currently listed in detail in Uber’s publicly available global announcement, so the practical reach of the service will be able to be assessed more precisely after bookings begin.
Uber Boat as part of a broader tourism strategy
The return of Uber Boat is not an isolated summer campaign, but part of the company’s larger shift toward travel. In the official GO–GET 2026 announcement, Uber said that it wants to unite three areas: movement, ordering and travel. That ambition fits into a trend in which large digital platforms seek to reduce the number of apps and steps that a user must go through during a trip. Instead of separately planning transportation to the airport, hotel booking, restaurants, local recommendations and excursions, Uber is trying to connect more services into one app and thus keep the user throughout the entire trip.
For coastal destinations, such an approach can have a special effect because tourist spending is not exhausted upon arrival at the destination. After accommodation and transportation, a significant part of demand relates to daily activities, excursions, gastronomy and additional services. The vessel rental service therefore fits into the logic of an app that wants to be present in more phases of a stay. Uber is thereby not competing only with taxi transportation or delivery apps, but also with intermediaries in tourism, booking services and platforms for local experiences. In practice, success will depend on the availability of the offer, price transparency, safety standards, local regulation and the ability of partners to respond to demand at the peak of the season.
What the partnership with Click&Boat brings
The cooperation with Click&Boat enables Uber to enter the nautical booking segment quickly without the need to build its own system of vessel owners and operators. Click&Boat is positioned as a European platform for vessel rental in numerous destinations, and through the partnership with Uber it gains an additional channel toward users who might not specifically look for a specialized boat app. Such a model corresponds to the broader development of the tourism market: users increasingly expect transportation, accommodation and experiences to be bookable directly from a mobile phone, with as few separate logins, searches and payments as possible.
Members of the Uber One program, according to the announcement, will receive a 10 percent return in the form of Uber credits on completed vessel bookings. That detail shows that Uber is also connecting the water-based service with its own loyalty program, thereby seeking to encourage repeated use of the platform. Credit obtained through one service can then be used for other orders or rides within Uber’s ecosystem, which is an important part of the business logic of subscription and loyalty programs. For users, clear information is key about which bookings the benefit applies to, when the credit is calculated and whether the conditions apply equally in all markets.
Hotel bookings first for users in the USA
Alongside European Uber Boat, at GO–GET 2026 the company also presented hotel bookings within the app, for now aimed at users in the United States of America. In partnership with Expedia Group, Uber is announcing access to an offer that should grow to more than 700,000 accommodation properties around the world. According to the published information, a hotel icon is being introduced in the app through which users can search and book accommodation, with filters such as price, guest ratings, hotel category, brand and amenities. Later during the year, vacation rentals from the Vrbo brand, which is part of Expedia Group, should also be included in the offer.
This step is particularly significant because Uber is entering an area in which strong global intermediaries in online travel already operate. The company is not trying only to add another function, but to expand the situations in which the app is opened during travel. If a user can book a hotel, order transportation, find a restaurant and request delivery of supplies in the same app, Uber gains more data about travel habits and more opportunities for transactions. At the same time, for users it remains important to compare booking conditions, cancellation options, price and the potential impact on hotel loyalty programs, because bookings through intermediary channels do not always have to bring the same benefits as direct bookings with hotels.
Travel Mode: a digital guide through airports, restaurants and local recommendations
One of the announced new features is Travel Mode, a functionality with which Uber wants to unite information and services useful during a stay outside the usual place of movement. According to the company’s description, Travel Mode should help with navigating busy airports, offer selected recommendations of local content, popular tourist locations and restaurants, and enable restaurant bookings through OpenTable. Uber describes it as a kind of personal travel assistant within the app, and not only as an add-on for ordering rides. The app thereby comes closer to the model of a travel companion that reacts to the context of travel, from arrival to the stay at the destination.
A particularly interesting part of the announcement relates to Uber’s version of hotel room service. In practice, users could order food and basic supplies directly to the accommodation address, including things they forgot to bring. Such a service connects Uber Eats, local delivery and travel needs, and could be relevant in large cities, tourist centers and destinations where guests often stay in hotels, apartments or short-term rentals. However, availability will depend on the market, local partners and the operational network of delivery people, so Travel Mode will not necessarily immediately have the same scope in all countries.
Accor and Uber connect loyalty programs
Uber also announced cooperation with Accor, one of the largest hotel groups, through which users can collect ALL Accor points through Uber rides and orders via Uber Eats, with additional benefits for Uber One members. In this way, travel and hotel loyalty programs are further connected with mobility and delivery services. For hotel chains, this is a way to remain present in the everyday habits of travelers even outside the stay in the hotel itself, while Uber gains another incentive for users to use its services both while traveling and at home.
Such partnerships show that the boundaries between the hotel industry, transportation, delivery and digital travel services are moving increasingly quickly. Points, credits and subscription benefits are becoming an important instrument for retaining users, but also a way of creating the feeling that several different travel costs can be connected into one rewards system. For end users, the greatest value will depend on the clarity of the rules, the possibility of combining benefits and the actual availability of services in the markets to which they travel. In conditions of strong competition, the transparency of benefits will be just as important as the breadth of the offer itself.
Broader context: Uber wants to become an app for the entire trip
The announcements from GO–GET 2026 clearly show that Uber is trying to expand the meaning of its app. Alongside hotel bookings, Travel Mode and Uber Boat, other functions were also presented, such as unified search, voice ordering of rides and services that combine transportation with delivery of drinks or snacks in selected ride categories. Although not all new features will be available in all markets at the same time, the direction is clear: Uber wants to reduce the difference between a transportation app, a delivery app and a travel platform. This is also an attempt to make the app used more often and in situations in which the user does not need only a car from point A to point B.
For tourist destinations, this opens several questions. Digital availability of services can increase the simplicity of bookings and the visibility of local offers, but at the same time it increases pressure on infrastructure, regulation and safety standards. With nautical services, rental conditions, insurance, the responsibility of the skipper or renter, local navigation rules and protection of the coastal area are especially important. Since Uber Boat is based on a partnership with a vessel rental platform, the quality of the experience will not depend only on Uber’s interface, but also on the specific service providers, the condition of vessels, the availability of crew and the rules of each destination.
The Croatian coast in the focus of seasonal digital services
In recent years, the Croatian coast has been strongly connected with the growth of nautical tourism, short excursions and digital booking models. The introduction of Uber Boat to the Croatian market as part of a broader European offer is therefore not a surprise, especially given the indented coastline and the high concentration of tourist demand during the summer months. Official tourist data about 1,244 islands, islets and reefs are often used as one of the recognizable elements of Croatia’s nautical offer, and precisely such a space is suitable for services that connect mobile booking and experiences at sea.
However, the actual effect of this service will depend on where it will be available, how broad the offer will be and how competitive prices will be compared with existing local charter and excursion models. Uber’s advantage may be the recognizability of the app and ease of use, while local providers already have experience working in the specific conditions of the coast, ports and seasonal crowds. If those two levels are well connected, users could gain simpler access to vessels and excursions, and service providers an additional sales channel. If, however, information about prices, rules and availability is not clear enough, the market will continue to look for proven local alternatives.
A new phase of competition in digital tourism
Uber’s announcements come at a time when the global travel market increasingly relies on apps that connect multiple services into a single experience. Expedia Group brings hotel inventory and online booking technology, Accor brings a hotel loyalty program, Click&Boat brings a nautical offer, and OpenTable brings restaurant bookings. In that combination, Uber seeks to be the interface through which the user accesses different parts of the trip. This is a commercially logical move: the company already has a large user base, stored payment methods, movement data and the habit of opening the app at moments when a quick service is needed.
For travelers and the tourism market, the key question will be whether this integration will bring a genuinely simpler and more favorable experience or just another layer of intermediation. Uber announces benefits for Uber One members, easier hotel booking, local recommendations and vessel booking in Europe, but each of those services will have to prove itself in practice. The availability of Uber Boat in Croatian coastal destinations from June 2026 will be watched especially closely, because it is precisely there that a strong tourist season, a developed nautical offer and the need for clear rules come together. If Uber manages to connect the simplicity of the app with reliable local partners, this year’s expansion could mark an important step toward a model in which transportation, accommodation and destination experiences are planned from one digital place.
Sources:- Uber Newsroom – official GO–GET 2026 announcement with announcements of Travel Mode, hotel bookings, Uber Boat in Europe and new app functionalities- Associated Press – report on Uber’s expansion toward hotel bookings, the partnership with Expedia Group and new travel functions- Cadena SER – report on the launch of vessel bookings through Uber in five European countries and cooperation with Click&Boat- The Verge – analysis of Uber’s new functions, including hotel bookings, Travel Mode, voice ordering and expansion of the app- Croatia.hr – official tourist website with information about the Croatian coast, the nautical offer and 1,244 islands, islets and reefs
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