AEO INDEX OCTOBER 2026 USA: Travelpro tops AI’s luggage recommendations, but the three engines agree on the No. 1 brand for just one question in ten
ChatGPT, Gemini and Google AI Overviews each lean on a different favorite suitcase brand, and they read different sources to get there.
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Travelpro gets the top spot in AI luggage answers more often than any other brand. ChatGPT, Gemini and Google AI Overviews ranked it #1 in 8 of 30 answers, and it won five of the ten buying questions in Answer Engine Daily’s October 2026 AEO Index. The engines rarely agree with each other, though. Only on travel duffel bags did all three name the same brand first, and that brand was Patagonia.
Each engine has its own favorite. Google AI Overviews gave five of its ten first places to Travelpro, Gemini gave five to Briggs & Riley, and ChatGPT put Samsonite first four times. Samsonite shows up in 70% of all answers, more than any other luggage brand, and every one of its first places came from ChatGPT.
We collected the answers on 21 October 2026 from a single U.S. location, with analysis powered by markaeo.com. The figures come from the full October 2026 report, which tracks 36 brands.
Who comes out ahead on luggage?
Every brand gets an AI Rank Score from 0 to 100, which rewards being named high in an answer; first place on every engine and question would score 100. Travelpro scored 52.3. Briggs & Riley (44.3), Away (38.0) and Samsonite (37.7) come next, and then there’s a steep drop to Monos at 19.3.
Travelpro won carry-on, checked, softside, underseat bags and luggage sets. Sets was close, 73 to Samsonite’s 70. Being named and being named first are different results. Samsonite was first in 13% of answers and Away in 10%. Monos was named in 47% and came first in none.
How differently do the three engines answer?
The engines differ in length, sources and favorites:
- ChatGPT: Named Samsonite in 80% of its answers and ranked it first four times. Its 71 citations lean on blogs and review sites such as T3 (6) and Good Housekeeping (5). It cited no Reddit threads or YouTube videos.
- Gemini: Gave Briggs & Riley five first places. Its answers ran to about 1,131 words on average, and only 4 of the 10 cited any source.
- Google AI Overviews: Put Travelpro first five times, in answers of about 164 words. Google Shopping cards made up 26 of its 73 citations, or 35.6%.
On business travel, checked luggage and luggage sets the split is exact: Samsonite on ChatGPT, Briggs & Riley on Gemini, Travelpro on AI Overviews. Briggs & Riley still won business travel on the combined score, 80 to Tumi’s 73.
Gemini is the hardest to trace. Briggs & Riley was the most-mentioned brand on just 2 of the 70 cited pages we could read, against 12 for Samsonite. Of Gemini’s 26 citations, 26.9% went to brand websites, four of them travelpro.com. Nothing in the data explains why Gemini puts Briggs & Riley first so often.
Does the winner change once you leave suitcases?
Outside suitcases, a different set of brands wins. Osprey took travel backpacks with 93. Patagonia scored a perfect 100 on duffel bags, with The North Face second at 80. Overall, Osprey was named in 23% of answers and Patagonia in 20%.
Away won hardside (87) and kids’ luggage (73). On kids’ luggage, Pottery Barn Kids and American Tourister placed next, and each engine picked a different #1. Across the category, 90% of the 170 citations went to sites the brands don’t own. Google Shopping cards led with 26, then Reddit (8), then Forbes and OutdoorGearLab with 7 each.
What should luggage brands take from this?
My read: one blended “AI visibility” number would hide most of what happened in this category. Luggage teams need three reports, one per engine, because each engine reads off a different shelf. AI Overviews leans on product feed data and ChatGPT on editorial roundups. Gemini’s shelf is mostly out of view.
Product data in Google Shopping is AEO work now, since it supplies more than a third of AI Overviews’ citations. And when the engines do show sources, it is roundups on sites like OutdoorGearLab and Pack Hacker that turn up.
The November edition will show whether any suitcase question gets all three engines to the same answer, and whether Gemini keeps putting Briggs & Riley first with so few citations behind it. The engine-by-engine tables are in the full October 2026 report.
How we measured: We asked ChatGPT, Gemini and Google AI Overviews 10 non-branded luggage buying questions, giving 30 answers, collected on 21 October 2026 from a single U.S. location. AI answers vary by time, place and user. The full method and notice are in the report.
Sources
- Answer Engine Daily AEO Index: Luggage, October 2026
