A Get Better Lab research report
Executive summary
The global wellness economy reached $6.8 trillion in 2024, 6.12% of world GDP, and the Global Wellness Institute projects $9.8 trillion by 2029 (GWI, 2025). Travel is one of the clearest places to watch the shift. People increasingly want a trip that leaves them healthier, not one they need to recover from.
Wellness tourism was worth $651 billion in 2022 and is projected to pass $1.4 trillion by 2027. International wellness travelers spend 41% more per trip than the typical international tourist (GWI, 2023). Up to 60% of consumers surveyed by McKinsey across four countries call healthy aging a top or very important priority (McKinsey via NutraIngredients, 2025).
Destinations are responding by redesigning around two groups: longevity seekers who stay longer and return, and families traveling across three generations. The leading properties pair diagnostics, sleep, movement, and nutrition with space designed for longer stays.
The weak point is what happens after guests go home. A week of good sleep and clean food resets the body, but home brings back the same schedule, the same stress, and the same defaults, and the change fades unless it is anchored to something larger. Get Better treats a retreat as the start of a plan, connecting the experience to a person's Calling, their Growth Foundation, and the weekly habits that carry it forward.
The wellness economy by the numbers
Wellness has doubled in size since 2013 and is growing faster than the global economy around it. Every one of the 11 sectors GWI tracks now exceeds its 2019 level.
| Measure | Value | Context |
|---|---|---|
| Global wellness economy, 2024 | $6.8 trillion | Up 7.9% from 2023 |
| Share of global GDP, 2024 | 6.12% | Wellness grew 6.5% a year from 2013 to 2024 |
| Projection, 2029 | $9.8 trillion | 7.6% average annual growth |
| Fastest-growing sector | Wellness real estate | 19.5% a year, 2019 to 2024 |
| Second fastest | Mental wellness | 12.4% a year, 2019 to 2024 |
| Wellness tourism | $651 billion (2022) to $1.4 trillion (2027, projected) | 819 million trips in 2022 |
Sources: GWI 2025 Global Wellness Economy Monitor; GWI wellness tourism projection.
North America, the Middle East and North Africa, and Europe grew fastest over the last five years. The two fastest sectors point in the same direction: people are spending on where they live and on how their minds feel, and both are long-term commitments rather than one-off purchases.
From escape to renewal
For decades, luxury travel sold escape: a week away from work, a beach, a milestone celebrated once. That model still works, but it caps how long guests stay and how often they come back.
The Maldives shows both the strength and the limit. The country welcomed a record 2,047,435 visitors in 2024, up 9% from 2023 (PSM News, 2025). Its brand is built heavily on couples and honeymoons, and the average stay was about 8.1 days in early 2024 (Maldives Voice, 2024). A honeymoon happens once. A guest who comes to sleep better, train, and get a full health review has a reason to return every year.
That difference changes the economics. Longer stays fill rooms in the off-season and turn one-time visitors into repeat guests. Programs built around health give a destination something to offer beyond its scenery.
It also changes what guests expect. A renewal trip is judged by how a person feels a month later, not by how the photos look. That standard is harder to meet, and it rewards destinations that think beyond the stay itself.
Who is driving demand
Two groups are reshaping the high end of travel, and they complement each other.
Longevity seekers
McKinsey surveyed more than 9,000 consumers in the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, and China, and up to 60% said healthy aging is a top or very important priority (McKinsey via NutraIngredients, 2025). Many of these travelers are executives, founders, and recent retirees with flexible schedules. They look for diagnostics, sleep and nutrition programs, and coaching, and they will pay for depth. GWI found that international wellness travelers spend $1,764 per trip, 41% more than the average international tourist, and domestic wellness travelers spend 175% more than their typical counterparts (GWI, 2023).
Families across generations
Grandparents, parents, and children traveling together want shared experiences, separate spaces, and programming for every age. These trips tend to cluster around school holidays, while longevity travelers can come in quieter months. A destination that serves both groups fills more of its calendar.
What the two groups share
Both want time that matters. The longevity guest wants more healthy years. The family wants those years spent together. Both are buying the same thing at different scales: a life that stays full for longer.
What leading longevity destinations get right
The strongest properties redesign three things at once: the space, the programming, and the partnerships behind it.
| Pattern | What it looks like | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Medical depth | Diagnostics and physician review alongside spa and movement programs | Lanserhof Tegernsee, Germany |
| Personalized programs | An assessment on arrival that sets the plan for the stay | Six Senses Ibiza, Spain |
| Extended residential stays | Multi-week programs and rooms built for living, not just sleeping | COMO Shambhala Estate, Bali |
| Culture as the program | Daily rhythms, food, and community from a long-lived population | Okinawa, Japan |
| Space for every generation | Multi-bedroom villas, separate zones for children, adults, and elders | Family-focused resorts in the Maldives and Caribbean |
Design for the body, not just the view
Longer stays need kitchens, workspaces, quiet rooms, and places to train. Universal design features such as wide doors, level floors, and grab bars make a property work for guests in their seventies and eighties, which matters when three generations share a villa.
Programming with a beginning and an end
The best programs start with an assessment, set a clear focus, and finish with a review. Sleep, movement, nutrition, and stress recovery carry most of the benefit. Advanced testing adds value when it informs a plan the guest can follow at home.
Partnerships that earn trust
Clinical partners, credentialed staff, and transparent methods separate a credible longevity program from a spa menu with new labels. Guests who are paying for health outcomes increasingly ask who designed the program and what evidence supports it.
Why most retreats fade, and what makes change last
A retreat removes friction. Meals are prepared, the schedule is set, sleep is protected, and stress is far away. The body responds quickly to those conditions. Then the guest flies home to the same calendar, the same kitchen, and the same pressures, and the old patterns are waiting.
The problem is rarely motivation. It's that the retreat changed the environment for a week without changing the system a person lives inside for the other 51.
The Get Better approach
Get Better treats a retreat as the start of a plan rather than the whole intervention. The system has three parts, and each one has a job before, during, and after the stay.
| Part of the system | Before the stay | During the stay | After the stay |
|---|---|---|---|
| Self-Awareness | Life Quality Score baseline across Calling, Health, Connection, and Resources | Understanding the Human (biology, nervous system, drives) and the Being (purpose, direction) | Repeat the LQS to see what held and what slipped |
| Get Better Framework | Clarify what the guest wants the next chapter to hold | Define Calling, assess the Growth Foundation, and draft a three to five year vision | Review the vision quarterly and adjust |
| Life Transformation System | Identify the habits and hours most in the way | Choose a small set of foundation habits and practice them daily | Schedule them across the 168-hour week and build from there |
Why purpose holds the habits in place
People keep habits that serve something they care about. A guest who leaves with a clear Calling, the work and contribution they want the next decades to hold, has a reason to protect sleep, keep training, and guard their attention. That reason travels home. A spa treatment doesn't.
Start with the foundation
We can do anything, but we can't do everything. You can't start with the second floor. The Life Transformation System begins with the few habits that carry the most weight, usually sleep, daily movement, and recovery from stress, and adds more only once those are stable. It's how a person does the right thing and does the thing right.
What this means for destinations
Properties that build follow-up into the offer, through an assessment before arrival, a plan at departure, and check-ins in the months after, give guests results they can feel at home. Those guests are the ones most likely to return. Get Better Lab designs its private retreats on this model.
Key takeaways
- Wellness is a $6.8 trillion economy and is projected to reach $9.8 trillion by 2029, growing faster than global GDP.
- Wellness tourism is heading toward $1.4 trillion by 2027, and its travelers spend 41% more per international trip than the average tourist.
- Healthy aging is a mainstream priority. Up to 60% of consumers in four major markets rank it top or very important.
- Destinations built on one segment are exposed. Longevity seekers and multi-generational families stay longer, travel in different seasons, and return.
- The leading properties combine design, programming, and credible partners, and they judge success by how guests feel months later.
- Retreats fade when home stays the same. Lasting change needs a baseline, a vision tied to purpose, and weekly habits built from the foundation up.
Sources
- Global Wellness Institute. 2025 Global Wellness Economy Monitor. Link
- Global Wellness Institute. Wellness tourism will cross the $1 trillion mark in 2024. November 2023. Link
- McKinsey & Company. Future of Wellness survey, 2025, as reported by NutraIngredients. Link
- PSM News. Maldives records over two million tourist arrivals in 2024. Link
- Maldives Voice. Maldives witnesses increase in tourists' average stay duration to 8 days. March 2024. Link
This report reviews published research and industry data for a general audience. It is not medical, financial, or investment advice, and the destinations named are examples, not endorsements.
About Get Better Lab
Get Better Lab is a Boston-based personal growth company founded by technology entrepreneur, author and Shark Tank alum Dean Whitney. The company builds tools, programs and coaching grounded in the Get Better framework, a neuroscience-based system for understanding where a life stands and changing its direction. Learn more at GetBetterLab.com and GetBetterApp.com.
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