Global urban market performance is strengthening, propelled by a surge in international travel and the return of business and group demand. Markets like London, New York and Tokyo are expected to lead global RevPAR performance in 2024 as travelers continue to return to cities.
Growth was balanced with 64% of markets showing increased occupancy and 70% achieving a higher average daily rate (ADR) than last year.
The 10 highest hotel supply countries outside of the U.S. saw occupancy that was largely in line with the comparable week last year. Seven of the 10 countries saw an occupancy change between -2ppts and +2ppts.
Outside of the U.S., YoY performance for the top 10 countries was largely swayed this week by a Chinese New Year calendar shift. The annual holiday occurred two weeks earlier last year. Only two other countries, Canada and Germany, saw declines - albeit small ones at -1.3ppts and 1.4ppts, respectively.
For the second straight week, the U.K. saw the highest occupancy (68.4%) across the top 10 countries outside of the U.S., posting an increase of 1.8ppts YoY as well as seeing an exact occupancy match to the day-to-day comparable year of 2018.
STR Weekly Global Hotel Industry Performance Insights: 21-27 January 2024
Outside of the U.S., China posted the highest RevPAR gain (+56%) of the 10 largest countries based on supply. Next on the growth list was Japan (+35%), Indonesia (+18%) and Germany (+14%). France and Mexico were the only two top 10 countries to report decreasing RevPAR (-0.8 and -6.1%, respectively).
The U.S. Travel Association this week called out Spain as one of the most popular international markets. Hotel performance in markets across Spain reflected this popularity for 2023 and into 2024.
Across the four global regions, China showed the most dramatic improvement in revenue per available room (RevPAR), increasing 50% year over year (YoY) during the past four weeks.
Notably, 20 of 25 European countries recorded RevPAR growth in this run-up to the holiday season, wrapping up a strong performance year around the continent.