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, hospitality market leaders are looking toward 2026 with careful optimism. Increasing operational expenses are slated to challenge owners this year and lower-tier sections might have a hard time in the middle of a growing wealth bifurcation.

And through all of it, hotel business are anticipated to fortify their portfolios with brand-new brand offerings and collaborations. As the year gets underway, Hotel Dive talked with hospitality leaders from differing corners of the market about their 2026 predictions. Below are the leading patterns expected to effect hotel operations, performance, net system development and more this year.

Total wages, salaries and advantages paid by U.S. hotels increased to $127 billion in 2025, according to data from the American Hotel & Accommodations Association, shared with Hotel Dive. In 2026, that figure is predicted to climb to $131 billion, representing an approximately 3% year-over-year increase, per AHLA. For hotel owners, increasing labor expenses posture an obstacle to net operating income development, Kevin Davis, Americas CEO at JLL Hotels & Hospitality, told Hotel Dive.

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Increasing labor costs have actually been a difficulty for hoteliers for years, Davis said, particularly following the COVID-19 pandemic. In general, hotel labor costs have increased 15.3% from 2019 to 2025, surpassing the 12.8% growth in total operating profits, according to AHLA.

3, 2024 in San Francisco, California. Justin Sullivan by means of Getty Images In 2026, Davis noted, union settlements will be "front and center" in New York City, where the New York Hotel and Gaming Trades Council's union contract with the Hotel Association of New York City City is set to end in July.

Last year, the union backed New york city City's newly elected Mayor Zorhan Mamdani, who operated on a promise to raise New york city City's minimum wage to $30 per hour by 2030. Hotel market associations, consisting of AHLA, have actually denounced comparable legislation throughout the nation, including the recently passed $30 wage regulation in Los Angeles. "Need has not kept up with this pace," she stated. Wages, incomes and payroll-related expenses paid by hotels now account for more than 32% of total profits, according to AHLA.

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As more hotel visitors turn to synthetic intelligence to improve their travel experience, reserving hotels straight through big language models (LLMs) might be next, hospitality specialists stated. Agentic commerce a procedure by which self-governing AI representatives act on behalf of a consumer to discover, compare and complete purchases is a trend that has sped up across industries like retail.

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According to PwC's 2025 Holiday Outlook report, 76% of millennials stated they're most likely to use AI for travel recommendations. That number is growing, Jonathan Kletzel, PwC's travel, transport and logistics leader, informed Hotel Dive. Michael Klein Head of retail, travel and hospitality product marketing at Talkdesk To stay competitive with direct booking, larger multibrand hotel companies will "embed LLMs into their own brand name websites and mobile apps, and change the method the customer searches," Kletzel said.

"If you are not discoverable in an LLM search engine result which many brand names aren't, and this is the big panic that they're all going through today consumers aren't going to consider you," he stated. Michael Klein, head of retail, travel and hospitality item marketing at AI customer experience platform Talkdesk, similarly told Hotel Dive that hospitality gamers need to guarantee their property information is being indexed by LLMs to appear in traveler queries.