AlUla has added seven destination management companies to its Preferred DMC Program, expanding its distribution network to 19 travel partners as Saudi Arabia pushes to convert international demand into booked arrivals at the heritage destination.

The new partners are ROAM, RIDA International, 88 Destinations, Onedar, Desert Adventures, Arabia Explorer, and Young Life. They join 12 existing DMCs in the program and will handle travel bookings, itinerary planning and local operations across Europe, the Gulf, the US, Asia, Latin America and China. Young Life will focus specifically on the Chinese market.

The move is a distribution play, not a marketing one. DMCs sit between tour operators, travel agencies and on-the-ground suppliers — the intermediaries that package and sell the destination's hotels, ground services and experiences. Widening that bench from 12 to 19 partners gives AlUla more contracted capacity in the source markets Saudi tourism authorities have prioritized.

How will the new DMCs sell AlUla?

The seven companies will support travel bookings, itinerary planning and local operations. For sellers of travel, that means new contracting routes into a destination whose inventory is being built out rapidly by the Royal Commission for AlUla, the state body developing the region under a long-term tourism strategy.

AlUla's asset base anchors the pitch: Hegra, Saudi Arabia's first UNESCO World Heritage Site, plus the ancient sites of Dadan and AlUla Old Town. The destination spans 22,561 sq. km in northwestern Saudi Arabia and hosts cultural, sporting and entertainment events year-round — the kind of programming DMCs package into itineraries.

Is the infrastructure keeping pace?

The DMC expansion tracks measurable capacity growth. AlUla International Airport recently expanded its lounge and terminal area by 44 percent, lifting annual passenger capacity by 75 percent to 700,000. The airport now operates smart e-gates and 12 international arrival counters.

Air access remains weighted toward domestic and regional routes: flights connect AlUla from Riyadh, Jeddah and Dammam, with regional services from Doha. That limits long-haul inbound to connections — a constraint the expanded DMC network is partly designed to work around by channeling visitors through Gulf hubs.

What does it mean for the trade?

For tour operators and agencies in the covered markets, the seven new DMCs create additional — and competing — supply lines into AlUla product. The Royal Commission frames the destination's development as tourism-led while preserving archaeological and natural heritage, and the DMC program is the mechanism that turns that state investment into sellable inventory abroad.

No commission structures, booking volumes or partner targets were disclosed, so the commercial terms remain opaque. What is measured is capacity: 19 partners, a 700,000-passenger airport, and a state developer with a long-term mandate. Expect further network expansion as AlUla scales toward its visitor targets.

(Original reporting by Rahaf Jambi, Arab News, Oct. 4, 2026)