For 39 days, the 2026 FIFA World Cup moved millions of travellers across 16 host cities in the United States, Canada and Mexico. Hotels entered the tournament expecting one of the largest event-driven demand surges North America had seen, with supporters, sponsors, media teams and corporate guests competing for rooms around 104 matches.
At first glance, the results appeared to confirm those expectations. Across U.S. host markets, revenue per available room rose by more than 20% in several tournament weeks, while average rates on match days climbed almost 26%.
However, the increase in revenue did not always come from hotels selling more rooms. Occupancy remained broadly flat on match nights and weakened on the days between fixtures. Fans shortened stays, regular summer visitors changed plans and conferences shifted away from some host cities.
As the tournament progressed, those differences became clearer. Some markets sustained demand across several rounds, while others relied on one marquee match, a favourable team draw or another major event taking place at the same time.
Sustained Winners
Dallas and Philadelphia produced the clearest repeated gains, although they reached that outcome through different demand structures.
For Dallas, more matches reduced the gaps between demand peaks. Dallas Stadium in Arlington hosted nine matches, the most of any World Cup venue. Eight were played between June 14 and July 6 before the July 14 semifinal, with gaps of only two to five days giving hotels repeated booking waves. It was one of only three U.S. hosts where occupancy increased during the first two weeks, while Arlington hotels generated a record $31 million in June room revenue, above the previous high of $23.6 million. RevPAR was still up 26.6% in semifinal week, supported by a 21.5% ADR increase.
What also helped was that downtown Dallas also housed the World Cup’s International Broadcast Centre at the Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center, bringing international production and technical teams into Dallas independently of the match calendar. A 34-day fan festival at Fair Park created another continuous tournament venue between fixtures.
For Philadelphia, citywide programming extended the value of six matches between June 14 and July 4. Across those six dates, Center City hotel revenue increased 50.3%, RevPAR rose 52.4% and ADR grew 47.5% compared with the same dates in 2025. More than 400,000 spectators from 190 countries attended the six games.
Philadelphia’s final match on July 4 coincided with the United States’ 250th-anniversary celebrations and the city’s Independence Day programme, helping occupancy reach about 90% over the holiday weekend, while a tournament-long fan festival at Lemon Hill drew an estimated 250,000 people and sustained activity beyond the stadium.
Strong but Rate-Led or Match-Dependent Winners
San Francisco, Kansas City, Miami and New York all produced some of the tournament’s largest hotel gains. However, their results depended more heavily on high room rates, particular fixtures or another event occurring alongside the World Cup.
San Francisco benefited from the Databricks Data + AI Summit, which brought more than 30,000 attendees to the city during the opening week. Together, the summit and World Cup lifted rooms sold 11.8%, ADR 40.1% and RevPAR 56.5%. The two events supported different parts of the Bay Area and filled weekdays that were weaker in many other host markets, although a soft 2025 comparison also increased the year-over-year gain.
Kansas City’s strongest match windows followed a weak booking build-up after FIFA released thousands of reserved rooms close to the tournament, forcing hotels to rebuild demand quickly.
Once matches began, RevPAR rose 44.7% in the first full week, including a 166.7% single-night increase around Argentina–Algeria, and remained 35% higher during quarterfinal week. However, ADR increased 45.3% while occupancy fell 4.7 percentage points, showing that pricing drove most of the gain. Kansas City’s lower rate base kept it more affordable than New York, Miami or San Francisco, but added short-term-rental supply and released room blocks prevented sustained occupancy compression.
For Miami, the teams determined the strength of demand. It began the tournament as an underperformer. During the first full week, RevPAR fell 6.5% and rooms sold declined 15.3%. In fact, occupancy was lower than the previous year on each of the first ten tournament nights, with daily declines ranging from 9% to 20%.
But then, matches involving Brazil, Colombia and Portugal brought travelling supporters and activated South Florida’s large Latin American communities. During June 21–27, Miami led major U.S. markets with a 51.6% RevPAR increase. ADR rose 51.1% across five consecutive days spanning the Brazil–Scotland and Colombia–Portugal fixtures. Even in Miami’s strongest week, however, occupancy rose only 0.3 percentage points. The Brazil–Scotland match briefly lifted occupancy to 77.2%, but higher rates remained the main source of RevPAR growth.
Miami later posted another 38% RevPAR gain during July 5–11 with occupancy broadly unchanged, showing how strongly its result depended on the teams involved and their supporters’ willingness to pay.
New York-New Jersey followed a late booking curve. As of June 1, only 28% of New York City rooms were booked for the July 19 final, compared with 40% for the same date a year earlier, while the region’s large supply absorbed earlier tournament demand without creating scarcity.
The final changed that pattern. On July 18, occupancy reached 95.7%, ADR $610.48 and RevPAR $584.32, the highest single-day result among U.S. hosts, as supporters booked after the participating teams were confirmed. Fanatics Fest at the Javits Center added demand from visitors drawn by athlete appearances, collectibles, interactive exhibits, live programming and World Cup screenings, extending the weekend’s appeal beyond those attending the final.
Mixed Positive Markets
Toronto, Houston and Atlanta finished with higher hotel revenue, but the gains came with weaker occupancy or displaced demand.
For Toronto, higher rates offset a softer occupancy base. From the start of the tournament through July 4, RevPAR increased 8.8%. During the final group-stage week alone, RevPAR rose 12.4% as ADR increased by more than 26%, even though occupancy declined. That pattern placed Toronto ahead of Vancouver, where a similar rate increase failed to prevent RevPAR from falling. Toronto’s occupancy loss was limited enough for higher room prices to produce a positive overall result.
However, the market did not develop the repeated compression seen in Dallas or the wider event-led demand recorded in Philadelphia.
Houston witnessed a positive but lower-intensity gain. It produced a clear full-period uplift through its final match on July 4, but the scale was below the tournament’s stronger performers. From June 12 to July 4, hotel revenue rose 20%, ADR increased nearly 21% to $147 and RevPAR grew 19% to $89, while occupancy edged down one percentage point to 61%. Houston's results in comparison to Dallas, Kansas, and San Francisco were more moderate and concentrated in downtown hotels, with some outlying districts raising rates despite weaker demand.
For Atlanta, football demand could not replace the groups that moved. The city hosted eight matches through the July 15 semifinal, generating about 442,000 hotel room nights. RevPAR rose 11% and hotel revenue 15% despite occupancy falling about 4%, while matches and the fan festival drew more than one million visits. However, many festival attendees were local or regional, limiting the overnight impact.
Atlanta’s convention calendar had also shifted before the tournament. Atlanta Market moved from July to June 9–14, while other conferences changed dates or locations. The effect was clearest during semifinal week: despite a sold-out England-Argentina match, occupancy fell 8.2 percentage points, RevPAR declined 6.4% and the city sold roughly 61,000 fewer room nights as group demand dropped 41.4%.
Underperformers
Vancouver and Seattle raised prices around the World Cup but lost too much of their normal summer demand to produce a broader hotel boom.
In Vancouver, the seven-match programme ended on July 7, yet performance remained weak through much of the hosting period. From June 11 to July 4, ADR rose 19.6%, while RevPAR fell 3.1%. By June 27, downtown occupancy had dropped to 75% from 91% a year earlier, even as rates exceeded CAD 500 during the second half of the month.
The city normally benefits from strong leisure, cruise and convention demand. However, some regular visitors changed dates or avoided expected congestion and higher prices, while World Cup supporters did not replace the lost room nights. During the opening week, ADR rose more than 20%, but occupancy fell 20.9 percentage points and RevPAR declined 5.2%.
The recovery further supports this displacement explanation. Vancouver’s first major post-tournament conference began on July 10, three days after its final match, while July and August occupancy was expected to return above 90%.
Seattle showed a similar pattern. Across its four hosting weeks, occupancy averaged 73.9%, 6.9 percentage points below 2025. Match-related peaks could not replace conferences and business groups that had shifted away, while bookings were already estimated to be 20% lower before the tournament.
The contrast became clear afterward. In Seattle’s first full post-hosting week, occupancy rebounded to 90.5%, 3.3 percentage points above 2025, as overlapping conferences lifted luxury and upper-upscale group demand by 41.5%.
Incomplete Data
Boston, Los Angeles and Mexico’s host cities showed positive signs, but incomplete and combined reporting limits comparison.
From June 12 to 27, Boston’s ADR rose 20.7% to $410.44 and RevPAR 20.3% to $357.36, while occupancy held near 87%. However, the figures exclude its later knockout matches. Los Angeles was one of only three U.S. hosts to increase occupancy in the first two weeks, but no cumulative result has been published through its July 10 quarterfinal, and its dispersed supply reduced citywide compression.
Mexico City, Guadalajara and Monterrey posted combined RevPAR growth of 39.9% in the first full week and 47.5% in the next. The aggregate, however, masks stronger national-team demand in Mexico City and Guadalajara and a weaker fixture schedule in Monterrey.
Takeaway
The World Cup rewarded markets that could generate demand beyond the match itself. Dallas and Philadelphia combined fixture density with media operations, public programming and established event demand, while San Francisco, Miami, Kansas City and New York depended more heavily on particular matches, overlapping events or sharp rate increases.
The weaker results in Vancouver, Seattle and parts of Atlanta show the risk of measuring a mega-event only through match-night pricing. Hotels can raise ADR substantially and still underperform when regular leisure visitors, conventions and group business shift away. For future host markets, the strongest outcomes will depend on retaining existing demand, filling the days between fixtures and converting stadium attendance into longer, citywide stays.