A helicopter soaring above a group rafting down an Icelandic river. Ziplining at Costa Rica’s Arenal Volcano. Finding fossils on an archaeological dig in Wyoming.

What all these adventures have in common is they were had by families looking to connect with each other by disconnecting from their devices.

Screen fatigue is changing the way families travel. While beach vacations and Disney World are often considered the quintessential trips for families with kids, many families are in search of more active and adventurous holidays that encourage children to ditch their phones. From scuba diving, rock climbing and scaling mountains on the extreme end to something as approachable as camping, families are looking for anything that leaves them with a story to tell.

It’s a growing segment of adventure travel that existed well before the pandemic but that travel professionals say was accelerated by it as families, cooped up in their homes, sought ways to create unforgettable memories.

Virtuoso had named adventure trips as the top trend for family travel back in 2019. But it’s only grown since then: the Adventure Travel Trade Association’s 2026 Trends & Insights Report found that more than one-third of its members said family and multigenerational demand was increasing. Members also reported that families made up about 20% of their guests on average, the third-largest traveler type after couples and friend groups, outpacing solo travelers.

“Families want a story they can retell, not just about places they visited — achievement has become the new luxury,” said Jimmy Carroll, the co-founder of Pelorus Travel, the luxury bespoke adventure tour operator that planned the aforementioned Iceland rafting trip. The family was flown to a remote region of Iceland via helicopter, which swooped overhead as the group paddled furiously down the river before enjoying a backcountry barbecue in the remote landscape.

A story to tell, indeed.

No single definition

Tour operators across the spectrum are expanding their adventure-themed family itineraries to meet the demand.

Intrepid Travel announced a collection of premium family trips this year, while G Adventures has been expanding its portfolio of offerings in recent years. Tauck Bridges, Tauck’s family brand, offers a handful of adventure-forward journeys, including the jungle rafting and zipline tour at Costa Rica’s Arenal Volcano.

G Adventures and Intrepid, which already offer adventure travel, lean on that expertise to cater to the family market. G says its family itineraries strike a balance between education and adrenaline, while Intrepid markets its tours as a fit for curious families.

Adventure travel specialists say the niche has no standard definition.

Travel advisor Kathy Lubrano of Lubrano Travel in Crowley, Texas, said that adventure travel is a mindset, which everyone defines differently. And families often don’t reach out to her specifically seeking “adventure travel,” even if that’s what they’re after.

What they ask for is “fun,” she said, highlighting an important distinction: Even those participating in adventure might not identify with the label and proactively seek such a trip.

As an example, Lubrano mentioned her daughter, who would not describe herself as an adventurous traveler yet hiked to Mount Everest Base Camp — an undeniably adventurous activity.

“I think everybody looks at adventure differently,” she said.

Angela Adto Tepper of AZA Luxury Travel in New York echoed that sentiment, saying her client roster spans multiple levels of activity and adrenaline: a 60th birthday group horseback riding, via ferrata climbing and canyoneering at a remote luxury resort to a family with a 7-year-old who wanted kayaking, ax throwing and bird watching.

The range shows the types of experiences possible on an adventurous vacation. The ATTA even describes some culinary experiences as “soft adventure,” highlighting the breadth of experiences it includes.

And age doesn’t limit families from pursuing adventure, Carroll said, citing an 8-month-old who joined their family on an African safari and another infant on a trip to Antarctica.

On the opposite end of the age spectrum, Pelorus designed a multigen family trip to New Zealand that included summiting a mountain. While the younger family members — from early teenagers to parents in their 50s — scaled the peak, the grandparents took a helicopter to the top, walking the last leg of the journey. The whole family celebrated with a picnic lunch at the summit.

“Age is no longer a blocker to activity,” Carroll said.

The breadth of experiences unravels the myth that all adventure travel is hardcore, said Liz Einbinder, head of partnerships and PR at Backroads, an active travel and adventure tour operator that offers hiking and walking tours.

“There’s that misconception out there that adventure travel or active travel needs to be extreme, when in reality, it’s very thoughtfully designed to really meet families where they’re at,” she said.

Backroads labels its itineraries by activity level: a 1 to 3 rating is light to moderate activity, while those rated a 4 or 5 are at the more rigorous end of the spectrum.

The operator is observing “steady growth” among families, particularly for trips involving teenagers and those in their 20s. The most popular itinerary for families at Backroads is its biking trip in France’s Brittany and Normandy regions.

Heather Kelly, the ATTA’s director of research and knowledge, said families are particularly drawn to itineraries that offer a mix of activity levels, enabling everyone on the trip to participate at their own pace. That is why Lucy Rudgard, an oceans and islands travel specialist with Scott Dunn, a luxury custom tour operator, said she incorporates a variety of activities, rather than focusing solely on high-thrill ones, when designing an itinerary.

The learning experience

When picturing summiting Mount Kilimanjaro or rushing down a river on a rafting trip, the educational value for children likely isn’t top of mind.

But that would be a mistake, travel professionals say. That dimension of adventure travel for families is perhaps its most powerful.

“Adventure can be educational,” Pelorus’ Carroll said. “If you’re rafting down the river into the jungle, that’s an amazing experience. But what are you learning? You’re learning how the jungle lives and operates, how the wildlife feeds off the different ecosystems there, how the river is the source of life to the trees and how the canopy grows.”

To accomplish this, Pelorus arranges for experts and naturalists to accompany guests on their journeys.

Adam Sebba, CEO of The Luminaire, a luxury travel agency, has seen the influence adventurous trips have had on his own children.

After an African safari, his children returned home to England as “little David Attenboroughs,” he said, obsessed with conservation and focused on endangered wildlife. And when in Norway, his children got a lesson in cultural cuisine by tasting reindeer and whale.

“It pushes children’s boundaries to be adventurous eaters as well as adventurous travelers,” he said. “I think it creates good travelers of the future.”

One of the most popular experiences Sebba designs for families is participating in a dinosaur dig with paleontologists in Wyoming. Nothing can beat the adrenaline children — and parents, too — experience on a live dig site, unearthing fossils that are millions of years old, he said. He added that the children learn about dinosaurs, evolution and climate change.

Even hotels are finding ways to cater to adventurous families through education.

The Preserve Sporting Club & Resort in Richmond, R.I., is an outdoor-lover’s paradise that offers a plethora of active excursions year-round, including fishing, archery, hunting and learning outdoor survival skills.

Owner Paul Mihailides said that skill-based learning was essential to the activities, with many tying directly to conservation efforts. Many of his guests live in cities and don’t have regular access to nature, so he hopes spending time outdoors will ignite a desire to protect it.

“Conservation through education,” he said.

A new kind of connection

What adventure-themed travel accomplishes that families are most in search of is simple: connection with each other. After all, isn’t that the whole point of a family vacation?

And, sure, family connection can be found on a beach, but participating in a shared activity deepens the experience of a family holiday.

As AZA’s Adto Tepper said, it’s not just about being together. It’s about doing something together.

Nearly every travel professional interviewed for this report said one of the biggest reasons their clients sought out adventureous trips with their kids was the opportunity to unplug and ditch their devices.

A digital detox is a huge motivator for parents choosing an adventurous trip over relaxed beach holiday. When families have devices, kids can text, play games and scroll, while parents may be tempted to check work emails, Backroads’ Einbinder said.

“Parents are tired of their devices,” said Richard Campbell of 10 Adventures, a tour operator based in Calgary, Alberta. “No one ever says, ‘Oh, we need to make sure there’s good WiFi for our kids to screw around on Netflix.’”

Getting the adrenaline pumping is the ultimate balm for a spirit fatigued by tech, Campbell said. His company arranges backpacking trips in the Canadian Rockies where service is spotty at best, and parents view the lack of connectivity as a feature of the trip instead of an inconvenience.

Alison Harford, assistant marketing director of the Moab Office of Tourism, said the biggest competition outdoors destinations face isn’t each other, it’s sites like Netflix and Instagram.

Being in nature with little or no cellphone reception forces a level of presence not achievable when your phone is pinging with notifications, begging for your attention, she said.

“If you’re jumping off a 40-foot cliff, you’re not thinking about anything,” Harford said. “These adventure trips have the capacity to hold all of your attention and make you really be present.”

“What’s driving families toward adventure over the beach or a theme park is the desire for shared, active experiences that actually connect them, to each other and to the places they visit,” Kelly said. “It’s the difference between watching a trip happen and being in it.”