The Most Common Items Lost on Holiday

It’s hard to top that holiday feeling, but the excitement can soon disappear when you realise you’ve misplaced something important. From phones and passports to sunglasses and chargers, our belongings often end up taking a one-way trip.

We’ve asked travellers which items they’ve accidentally lost while on holiday, finding out which are the most likely to be mislaid. Plus, we dive into some tips on what you can do to try and keep your valuables safe while away.

If you’ve ever misplaced something on holiday, you’re in good company. Nearly half (48%) of the travellers we spoke to admitted they’d lost at least one item while away.

So, what are we most likely to leave behind?

Top 10 most frequently lost items:

1. Sunglasses
2. Cap/hat
3. Clothing
4. Jewellery
5. Hotel room key
6. Charger
7. Wallet/purse/money
8. Headphones
9. Camera
10. Phone

It turns out sunglasses are the most commonly lost item. More than one in three (36%) holidaymakers who’ve lost something named them. Hats (25%) and other clothing items (23%) were also commonly misplaced, something around one in four respondents had lost.

Valuable items can sometimes go astray as well. Of the high-value items on our survey, jewellery was found to be mislaid most often, being misplaced by 16% of those who have lost something while on holiday.

Some even lost items that can be a real holiday headache. Hotel room keys were misplaced by 15%, and 14% said they’d lost their wallet or money. Tech took a hit too: one in ten (9%) had lost their camera, and 5% said their phone had vanished while away.

Other essentials that didn’t make it home included passports (4%), medication (3%) and house or car keys (2%). The rest of the list featured swimwear, bags, watches, chargers and headphones - the small but important bits we often forget to double-check for.

It seems as though the older we get, the more careful we are with our belongings. Travellers aged 18 to 24 were the most likely to have lost an item while on holiday - nearly two-thirds (63%) had lost one or more of the common items listed. This dropped to just over half (53%) of those aged between 25 and 39, and 48% of 40 to 54-year-olds. The holidaymakers least likely to have lost something were those aged 55 and over, as just 42% admitted to doing this.

We were surprised to learn that travellers who typically take winter sports holidays were some of the most likely to misplace items while away. A huge 71% of respondents who take these trips said they’d lost belongings before, beaten only by those who like to go on spa holidays, of which three-quarters (74%) admitted to losing things.

More than two-thirds (69%) of people who like to take multi-centre holidays have lost items, likely because there’s a greater chance of losing things when regularly changing accommodation. Travellers also had a good chance of misplacing items on popular breaks, including beach holidays (53%), city breaks (50%) and on trips with a mixture of relaxing and sightseeing (56%).

Lost something? It happens, but all is not lost.

Here’s what to try next:

• Let your accommodation, airline or rep know straight away, someone may have handed it in
• Check with the local lost and found
• Check whether your travel insurance covers the item
• Start organising replacements for essentials like passports or travel documents
• Cancel or block sensitive items like mobile phones or credit and debit cards

On a ski holiday, it’s fair to say that some items are harder to lose than others, skis and snowboards don’t exactly disappear into thin air. Still, forgetting your gloves at lunch or misplacing a jacket during après-ski can definitely slow you down.

We asked travellers who’ve brought ski gear with them if they’d ever lost any of it while away. Just 3% said yes, suggesting that ski lovers are, by and large, pretty good at looking after their kit.

If you do find yourself without all of the proper equipment, whether you’ve left your goggles on the slopes or misplaced your jacket while enjoying apres-ski, you don’t need to let it ruin your trip. Plenty of resorts offer an equipment hire service, allowing you to pick up skis, boots, snowboards and other equipment to get you back on track.

We would even recommend using a rental service to avoid the extra baggage that comes with travelling with your own equipment. When you book a holiday through VIP SKI, you can also pre-book your equipment, so it’ll be waiting for you when you arrive at your resort.

[1] Based on a YouGov survey of 2,001 travellers on 27 June 2025. Respondents were selected at random across several demographics. All statistics were sourced from this survey unless otherwise stated.