The fantasy of the 2026 World Cup resort and tourism ‘boom’

FIFA got here to North America years in the past promising that the 2026 World Cup would deliver thousands and thousands of tourists and billions of {dollars}. “The world will be invading Canada, Mexico and the United States [with] a big wave of joy and happiness,” FIFA president Gianni Infantino mentioned in 2022 as 16 host cities had been chosen. In anticipation, lodges in these cities hiked their summer season 2026 costs and ready to capitalize on the deluge.

But with two months to go, the long-promised World Cup growth hasn’t but materialized. Some within the U.S. tourism {industry} fear that it’s going to become little greater than a modest bump.

“It is not the cornucopia that FIFA talked about,” Vijay Dandapani, president and CEO of the Hotel Association of New York City, informed The Athletic.

Chris Nassetta, longtime president and CEO of Hilton Hotels & Resorts, admitted at a convention in Washington, D.C., final week that “the World Cup, at this point, doesn’t look as strong as what we had hoped.”

Others stay bullish and anticipate journey bookings to choose up over the approaching month. “We’re really not ready to pull the fire alarm yet,” Erik Hansen, the U.S. Travel Association’s head of presidency relations, informed The Athletic.

Rosanna Maietta, president and CEO of the American Hotel and Lodging Association, added: “The industry, for sure, is still expecting to see a bump from those two months.”

She acknowledged, although, that “a lot of our members are reporting that bookings are below their projections.”

Many have re-calibrated expectations. And throughout the 16 host cities, most lodges have walked again their pricing surge.

In the aftermath of the World Cup draw and schedule reveal in December, The Athletic analyzed resort costs within the 16 markets. The 96 lodges in our pattern had been, on common, charging $1,013 per night time across the opening match of their respective cities, in contrast with $293 for an equal keep in late-May, precisely three weeks earlier. The common improve was 328%.

The extent of the surge different from metropolis to metropolis, however touched each market and cohost nation. In the U.S., the typical per-night worth rose from $315 in late May to $1,028 throughout the first week of the event.

Four months later, on the identical lodges, costs for those self same June dates have fallen greater than 40% from their earlier peak.

They stay considerably greater than May costs, however throughout 63 of the 66 U.S. lodges within the pattern, the typical fee final week was $579 per night time round opening World Cup matches, down from $1,034 4 months in the past. (Three lodges had been faraway from the pattern as a result of charges had been not accessible on the Marriott and Hilton apps, from which the information was sourced, when this follow-up evaluation was carried out final week.)

The comparatively steep decline aligns with industry-wide knowledge and feedback from executives and analysts.

“We are re-adjusting based on the market,” Maietta mentioned.

Nearly everybody interviewed for this story mentioned they anticipate bookings to speed up between now and the beginning of the World Cup, and even throughout the event, which kicks off June 11 and concludes July 19. “I am still anticipating a banner summer,” Ed Grose, president and CEO of the Greater Philadelphia Hotel Association, informed The Athletic.

But the “soft bookings,” as Maeitta put it, are fueling some concern that this World Cup gained’t entice as many guests as first thought.

The posited causes vary from a broader U.S. tourism stoop to ticket costs which have dissuaded overseas followers, plus prices — together with the resort costs themselves — which have made a World Cup journey unaffordable for the overwhelming majority of the world.

Reasoning for unmet expectations

When FIFA final yr launched a “Socieconomic Impact Analysis” report and boasted that the World Cup “could help drive up to $40.9 billion in Gross Domestic Product (GDP)” within the U.S., its evaluation included an assumption that “40% of the total stadium attendance [would] consist of foreign tourists.”

If so, greater than 2.5 million seats on the World Cup’s 104 matches can be crammed by foreigners. Separately, officers speculated that the quantity may very well be round 3 million. And concurrently, they promised that thousands and thousands extra followers would come from afar with out tickets to partake in World Cup-adjacent festivities. Infantino mentioned final week that there can be “tens of millions from all over the world coming to the U.S. just to feel the vibe.”

With two months to go, nonetheless, bookings and ticket gross sales recommend that the World Cup, as a vacationer attraction, would possibly fall wanting these expectations.

According to April 6 knowledge supplied to The Athletic by CoStar, an actual property and hospitality knowledge agency, the share of accessible resort rooms already booked for matchdays in 9 of the 11 U.S. host cities was roughly equal to the share of rooms booked for a similar June and July dates on the identical level final yr.

In these 9 cities, excluding Philadelphia and Kansas City, bookings had been up 0.8 % on common. On group-stage dates, the uptick was barely greater (1.3 %). Including the 2 Canadian host cities, Vancouver and Toronto, nonetheless, there have been comparatively fewer bookings this yr in comparison with final.

Cities that aren’t usually summer season vacationer locations, similar to Dallas and Miami, have seen important upticks, particularly on the nights of common matches, together with England vs. Croatia and Scotland vs. Brazil.

Colombia vs. Portugal is one other Miami instance. Those matches “are going to bring a higher demand than maybe some of those earlier games, like Saudi Arabia, Cape Verde,” James D’Agostino, a normal supervisor at Gale Hotels in Miami, informed The Athletic.

But for lodges in different cities that will welcome thousands and thousands of vacationers even with out the World Cup, similar to New York or San Francisco, the event has not but had a noticeable influence.

“The pace, unfortunately, is the same as what it was last year,” Dandapani, the New York City resort affiliation government, mentioned.

Alex Bastian, who leads the Hotel Council of San Francisco, mentioned that within the Bay Area, “many of the hotels adopted conservative budgeting and forecasting strategies” based mostly on previous World Cups — after which based mostly on the 2026 match schedule announcement in December.

Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, Calif., close to San Francisco, is the one of the 11 U.S. stadiums that gained’t host a single high seed. “If Germany was at play or France was at play,” Bastian mentioned, “that would be a different impact than, for example, a team like Switzerland, or a team like, I don’t know, Jordan.”

Even in cities that obtained stronger attracts, the share of worldwide ticket patrons appears to be falling wanting the 40-50 % projection. Noelle LeVeaux, the Dallas host committee’s chief advertising and marketing officer, said recently that about 26-35 % of tickets are being bought by worldwide clients. FIFA knowledge distributed to the Los Angeles host committee and seen by The Athletic means that, equally, lower than a 3rd of the followers at L.A.’s matches could be coming from overseas.

Dandapani mentioned that FIFA’s pricing of tickets “at a really extraordinarily high level compared to” the 2022 Qatar World Cup had deterred vacationers. He additionally cited widespread “headwinds,” similar to strict visa insurance policies, which have “put a chill” on worldwide journey to the United States.

President Donald Trump’s “America First” agenda and rhetoric has additionally fueled widespread perceptions that the nation is unwelcoming. Throughout 2025, the primary yr of Trump’s second time period, “U.S. visitor numbers declined 5.5% against 2024,” according to the World Travel and Tourism Council, even because the journey and tourism sector skilled its “best year ever” globally.

The World Cup had been among the many causes that {industry} analysts anticipated the U.S. to rebound in 2026. Tourism Economics, a worldwide journey knowledge firm, initially projected a 3.9% improve in arrivals all through the calendar yr. But not too long ago, citing the “Middle East conflict” and its financial penalties, the agency downgraded its projection to “a moderate 3.4% gain.”

Aran Ryan, the corporate’s director of {industry} research, informed The Athletic through e mail: “We estimate World Cup attendees will boost growth in U.S. arrivals this year by about 0.8 to 1.3 percentage points … equivalent to about 742,000 incremental visitors during the tournament.”

‘Artificial early demand’

Pricing, in the meantime, was muddled by FIFA resort blocks. The world soccer governing physique, which owns and runs the World Cup, booked a whole lot or hundreds of rooms in every host metropolis. Then, like many conventions and different occasion organizers, it exercised its contractual choice to cancel a few of these reservations earlier this yr.

“FIFA’s room block overcommitment,” Maietta defined, “created artificial early demand.” Its opt-out then modified the supply-and-demand equation. Hotels out of the blue had extra rooms to promote, whereas potential guests had been maybe not as quite a few as anticipated.

So, all through 2026, they’ve adjusted costs accordingly.

The steepest decline in our pattern — which serves as a tough approximation of the market, removed from a precise measure — occurred in Atlanta, the place common costs from June 14-16 on the six randomly chosen vacationer lodges fell from $968 in December to $390 in April. (Atlanta’s slate of group-stage matches is arguably the second-most underwhelming of the 11 U.S. host cities, higher than solely the Bay Area.)

Boston, Philadelphia and Seattle additionally noticed costs lower by round 50%.

The most modest decline was in Dallas, the place the typical of $1,039 recorded in December has fallen to a still-high $773 across the first match at AT&T Stadium in close by Arlington, between the Netherlands and Japan. (England vs. Croatia is three days later.)

Other entities, in the meantime, have been including to the full value of a World Cup journey. On high of lodges and tickets (whose costs FIFA raised once more this month), transit companies in New Jersey and Massachusetts have introduced that matchday trains will value $150 and $80, respectively. Alternatively, FIFA is charging over $100 for parking at most or all matches.

“If they’re nickel-and-dimed every which way along that travel journey,” Maietta mentioned of followers, “it makes it really hard for them to want to come out with, say, a family, or spend that extra night at a hotel. … It all adds up.”

Optimists throughout the tourism {industry} word that the World Cup’s knockout rounds, which characterize 31% of matches and the best stakes, don’t lend themselves to superior journey planning. Many followers, they consider, will guide on the very final minute if their workforce wins and progresses from one stage to the following.

There are additionally nonetheless extra tickets to be distributed. FIFA mentioned Tuesday that it has bought 5 million, and {that a} new batch can be made accessible Wednesday at 11 a.m. ET. (The cumulative capacity of World Cup stadiums throughout the 104 matches is roughly 6.7 million.)

The query is how important the last-minute rush can be. No one is anticipating the “tens of millions from all over the world” that Infantino talked about, however the hope is that the World Cup will at the very least deliver a whole lot of hundreds to every host metropolis. And even when they’re expats who journey from throughout the United States, they are going to nonetheless give the event worldwide aptitude.

“I think it’s too early to tell,” Hansen mentioned of the last word influence. “I think plans are starting to be made now to come to the U.S. Ticket demand has been strong. So I think we’re going to start to see, in the next couple of weeks, how the data’s shaping out.”

Adam Crafton contributed reporting to this story