Kaspi Travel booked 538 billion KZT in gross merchandise value in 2025, making the travel vertical inside Kazakhstan's fintech super app Kaspi.kz the dominant booking channel in the country. The figure comes from the latest Online Travel Tracker report on Central Asia, and it underlines an uncomfortable reality for conventional online travel agencies: across the region, distribution power sits with the companies that own the payments layer, not the ones that own the search box.

The pattern repeats in neighboring markets. In Uzbekistan, payment players Click and Payme have both launched embedded travel services inside their wallets. In Kyrgyzstan, MBANK rebranded the booking platform Bookit.kg into MTravel and rolled out the country's first AI tour search assistant. Governments in all three countries — Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan — are separately building national tourism platforms, adding a state-backed competitive flank to an already crowded field.

Why fintech apps are winning travel distribution

The structural advantage is straightforward. Super apps already hold the customer's payment credentials, transaction data and daily engagement. Bolting on flights and hotels requires no incremental customer acquisition spend, while standalone travel startups must pay to reach users the fintech players already have.

Kazakhstan's broader digital economy reinforces that lead. E-commerce volume reached $14.7 billion in 2024, up 32% year over year. Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan all rank in the global top 15 for AI user growth, according to the report. The Kazakh government backs the shift with a dedicated AI ministry, a $10 billion data center deal with NVIDIA and Firebird, and 2026 declared the Year of Digitalisation and AI.

How thin is the independent startup field?

Very. Only 17 companies are listed in Kazakhstan's online travel sector — the region's largest travel market. Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan have even fewer. The report frames that scarcity as either a warning sign for investors or a wide-open opportunity for entrants who can carve out a defensible position against platforms that control payments, distribution and increasingly AI-driven search.

The competitive question the report poses for sellers of travel: how do independent startups compete when the biggest players already own the payments layer? The answer, for now, is that most are not competing head-on — the report points to differentiated models among the startups it tracks, rather than direct OTA-style replication.

What it means for travel sellers

For global distributors, suppliers and intermediaries watching Central Asia, the takeaway is that partnership economics now run through fintech rails. Any supplier seeking volume in Kazakhstan effectively routes through Kaspi Travel or positions against it; in Uzbekistan, Click and Payme hold equivalent gateways.

State platform ambitions add a second layer of channel risk: if national tourism platforms gain traction, inventory access and commission structures could shift again before independent players consolidate.

The Online Travel Tracker report identifies the specific startups worth watching and their differentiation strategies in the full volume, which covers Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan. With government AI strategies, super app expansion and state platforms all moving simultaneously, the region's distribution map will look materially different by the time Kazakhstan's Year of Digitalisation and AI concludes in 2026.