Abstract:
Purpose: The paper seeks to discuss smart technologies that are being applied in the
tourism industry, focusing more on Tourism 4.0. To be specific, it discusses potential
issues that may be identified with regard to benefits, challenges, and future
implications from such technological advancement to serve tourists better, make the
industry efficient, and create a sustainable practice of tourism.
Methodology: An extensive literature review was carried out in order to understand
the adoption of Tourism 4.0, smart technologies, and their various applications in the
tourism industry. Papers from peer-reviewed journals from Scopus database were
consulted with the purpose of identifying the main trends, challenges, and best
practices.
Results: The integration of smart technologies like artificial intelligence, the Internet
of Things, virtual and augmented reality, big data analytics, and blockchain has a very
great potential that will alter the face of tourism. It is bound to enhance the experience
of tourists, make the processes in the industry more efficient, and engender the
principles of sustainable tourism. However, several problems relating to data privacy
and security, a digital divide, and infrastructure constraints have to be overcome.
Implications: The findings of this study have an important contribution for tourism
businesses, policymakers, and technology providers in that smart technologies
embraced by the tourism industry can make the environment competitive, sustainable,
and customer-orientated.
The theoretical contribution: This present study is that it gives a wide overview of
the adoption of smart technologies in the tourism industry. It underlines the possible
benefits and challenges of the technologies at hand and gives important insight into
future research and industrial practices.
Originality: The originality of the current study comes from an attempt to discuss
how different smart technologies will be integrated in the framework of Tourism 4.0,
depicting holistically the future perspective of the tourism industry.
