Cloud-based hospitality platform Mews has released two reports examining performance data for U.S. hotels, shifting travel demand and how artificial intelligence is helping hoteliers adapt to new guest demands.
U.S. Hotel Performance
According to the H1 2026 United States Hotel Performance Report, the U.S. hotel sector is currently operating in an environment characterized by “heightened” macroeconomic and geopolitical uncertainty. During a webinar discussing the reports, Mews CEO Matthijs Welle said that the company sees a “really strong resurgence” in the country’s hospitality market, with both average daily rate and revenue per available room improving year over year.
“But if you're sitting here thinking, ‘Well, I'm not feeling it,’ you're not alone,” he said. “I think some of us definitely see an uplift in some parts of the U.S. but a lot of us struggle because costs are also increasing.”
With inflation on the rise, increased costs are “burdening” businesses, he noted.
Discussing the top three key performance indicators, Alessandro Bottero, Mews’ director of market development, said that consumer confidence in the U.S. has fallen significantly. “It's causing a lot of travelers to pull back on their discretionary spending,” he said. At the same time, international arrivals to the U.S. are down year over year. “Together, these two factors are keeping occupancy relatively stagnant.”
Occupancy has only grown about 2.3 percent year over year, he continued, which brings the average occupancy rate to 60.5 percent.
While he acknowledged that some of this increase is largely driven by major events like the World Cup, he noted that the games were a one-time demand driver. “So it's still too early to say whether this reflects a stronger underlying economy or simply a temporary spike in travel.”
As such, Bottero said that recovery is still uneven. “Hotels have done a good job of increasing rates to protect their margins, but they're doing it at a time when travelers are becoming more cautious with their spending. It's a very different dynamic than what we saw in 2023, when the industry benefited from both strong demand and strong pricing power. So while the numbers are moving in the right direction, they're also a reminder that hoteliers need to be really thoughtful about balancing occupancy, pricing and guest demand.”
Technology and Metrics
Jeremy Bratcher, CEO and co-founder of hotel franchisor Landingplace Hotels, said that his team is watching metrics like booking pace, shifts in the booking window (which, he noted, “continues to compress”), competitive pricing, channel mix and search behavior.
“What we find is that technology, when used correctly … allows us to process those signals much faster than manual processes and revenue management ever could,” he said. While the year-to-date upswing in RevPAR is “promising,” he continued, it's also coming off a soft 2025. “But what continues to go up, regardless of RevPAR performance, is [the] inflationary costs that owners continue to face.”
That, in turn, generates a material higher operating cost structure than what hoteliers had to work with only a few years ago.
“While the snapshots like this are great discussion starters, it's important we keep in mind that it's not just RevPAR,” Bratcher said. “When acquisition cost is taken [into] consideration, now we've got something that should be more at the forefront of that discussion.”
Bottero noted that hotel expenses are increasing by 5 to 10 percent year over year, while RevPAR is either flat or improving 3 percent annually. “That's creating significant pressure on profitability,” he said.
Bratcher said that it is “critical” to have a sophisticated commercial strategy that is supported with robust platforms and integrated systems to help influence decisions. “And really, those are now table stakes,” he said. If you're a hotel that doesn't have these types of systems, then you're only going to fall further behind.” Ultimately, Bratcher emphasized that technology is not replacing judgment. “Instead, it improves the speed, consistency and quality of the decision making.”
AI and the Hotelier Experience
According to Bottero, a full 78 percent of hoteliers are optimistic about AI's potential to improve their hotels' operations, and 83 percent say they completely or mostly trust AI-powered tools to support their decision making. At the same time, only about a third completely trust AI, but 50 percent say that they mostly trust it.
“What that means is that they're using it, finding it useful, but not handing it the keys,” he said. “And that is a really healthy relationship with the technology.”
Now that more programs are leveraging AI, Bottero cautioned that the technology is only as good as the data underneath it.
“If your data is fragmented across systems that don't talk to each other, if your guest records are incomplete, if your operational data lives in spreadsheets, AI can't help you in a meaningful way.” More importantly, he said, the hotels that are doing the data infrastructure work now are the ones that are going to be able to effectively use AI in the next two years.
With AI automating property-management and revenue-management systems, Bratcher sees the technology “generating meaningful returns” for the properties.
“It all allows staff to spend their time more focused on guest-facing items, while ensuring the consistency, accuracy, timeliness and—really—a more strategic approach is delivered through technology,” he said. “I'm a firm believer that when used properly, technology like this is an investment with positive ROI, not just an operational expense. And that's important to think about as you're spending your money on technology and upgrades—how's it going to help you deliver that ROI?”
To determine how much of a return on investment AI can provide, Bratcher advised “measuring” daily tasks and finding the worst friction point.
“Focus on that one first,” he said. “Do that, and then measure year-over-year performance for whatever that platform is responsible for, and then track your month-over-month performance as you're measuring and tracking. You can see: Are you getting the benefit from it or not?” If not, he suggests determining if the problem is human error, the platform or some combination of the two: “Are we just not putting the right humans with the right platform? So … that's why you need to focus on one thing at a time.”
AI and the Guest Journey
Mews’ Reimagining the Guest Journey in the Age of AI report has five main takeaways:
Discovery and booking will change forever: The guest journey is evolving into a single conversational flow by Generative AI, where a hotel’s visibility will be defined by the quality of data and the openness of application programming interfaces.
Hoteliers can own the guest experience: The rapid rise of Generative AI offers new levers to win direct bookings, but only for those investing in differentiating factors like bookable services. Allowing for greater personalization during booking will help hoteliers compete with online travel agencies.
Agentic AI begins back of house: Agentic AI will change hotel operations. Expect early wins in back-office operations, guest communications, and housekeeping, provided robust integrations and clear guardrails are in place.
Staff roles will evolve, not disappear: Automation will free teams from transactional chores, allowing staff to focus on high-impact, human interactions. The real winners will know where to preserve the magic of service.
2026 is a turning point: The next year offers a window for hoteliers to align their tech stack, data and training for AI-powered growth.