Former engineers from Meta have developed Airial, a cutting-edge AI tool designed to meticulously plan travel logistics and streamline complex trip arrangements. Founded by Archit Karandikar and Sanjeev Shenoy, who first connected as classmates in India, Airial leverages advanced artificial intelligence to structure detailed, end-to-end itineraries personalized for every traveler.
The platform is positioned as more than just an ordinary travel planner. Users describe the trips they’re envisioning, and Airial responds by assembling a complete travel plan, including recommended flights, hotels, and transport across multiple destinations. The AI then curates comprehensive daily itineraries filled with activities, sightseeing spots, and restaurant suggestions, specifically tailored to fit user preferences and dietary needs.
Airial provides an intuitive interface where travelers can review their trip overview, delving into daily schedules and exploring suggested locations that include practical details such as reviews, exact locations, available alternatives, and insights provided through a built-in AI assistant. Notably, users can engage interactively, posing specific questions to the assistant about particular venues or experiences.
Beyond itinerary management, the platform offers map views so travelers can visualize distances between planned activities and accurately assess practical considerations such as transit times and waiting periods at stations. Airial’s unique social features incorporate media content: users can enhance their itineraries by importing places featured in blogs or social media posts such as TikTok videos and Instagram Reels. It can even autonomously recommend relevant short-form videos to spark inspiration when travelers are uncertain how to spend their time.
Karandikar’s background spans notable engineering roles at leading tech firms including Meta, Google, and Waymo, specializing in the integration of AI into consumer products. Shenoy, meanwhile, comes from a career primarily centered on Instagram’s popular feature, Reels. Inspired by a personal passion for travel—and aiming to replicate the personalized experience offered by traditional family travel agents—they focused their collective expertise on building Airial’s sophisticated planning capabilities.
According to Karandikar, many current AI travel services provide only general drafting of itineraries, leaving users responsible for working out complicated details. In contrast, Airial’s sophisticated models integrate numerous APIs and intricately evaluate connectivity options, flight analysis, transport — and even proximity calculations concerning hotels and planned activities. At its technical core, Airial utilizes reasoning methods inspired by AlphaGeometry, a recent groundbreaking research paper from DeepMind on complex problem-solving algorithms in AI. Combining these advanced inference strategies with large language models (LLMs), the tool precisely compiles optimal itineraries that account for thousands of variables and personal preferences.
The startup has already drawn significant interest from investors, recently securing $3 million in seed funding. Montage Ventures led the round, with additional investments from entities such as South Park Commons and Peak XV (formerly Sequoia India), along with several individual backers from Meta, UiPath, and Dropbox.
Daphne Che from Montage Ventures praised Airial’s founders for their deep technical knowledge, highlighting that their advanced approach stands out in an increasingly crowded field. She emphasized that straightforward use of LLMs alone is insufficient for the complexity involved with detailed travel planning, and Airial’s advanced tech infrastructure offers an impressive solution in the marketplace.
Currently attracting tens of thousands of monthly visitors, Airial remains focused primarily on user growth rather than immediate revenue streams. The founders recently introduced collaborative features, enabling users to share travel plans, edit their friends’ trips, and conveniently add transport options such as cars and buses for multi-city travel planning.
Looking ahead, the team is planning to launch dedicated iOS and Android apps soon, implement targeted vertical search functions for accommodations and activities, and enhance discovery of influencer-created travel content, thereby continuing to refine the user experience.
