Hotel Bookings Surge by 70% in San Francisco
San Francisco’s hotels are being lifted by a strong resurgence in convention bookings in 2025, but a growing downturn in international travel to the U.S is also impacting the emerging recovery of the city’s lodging sector.
The San Francisco Travel Association (SF Travel), the city’s destination marketing organization, projected last week that Moscone-related room nights will total nearly 670,000 this year, driven by 32 major events that are being held at the downtown convention center.
That’s a 70% increase over last year’s tally of about 400,000, a cratering that could muster only half of the pre-pandemic peak of 800,000 as several major conferences bailed out of events at Moscone due to safety concerns in the downtown neighborhood.
This year’s calendar features a hefty slate of big-ticket attractions, including February's NBA All-Star Weekend and this month’s Game Developers Conference. Plus, the RSAC cybersecurity conference, Microsoft Ignite, an AI conference called HumanX, and Dreamforce are still to come.
The positive news of a convention resurgence in San Francisco is offset by a developing downturn in international travel to the United States that is impacting hotels in gateway cities across the nation.
“While meetings and business travel are projected to increase this year, leisure travel is not expected to see robust growth due to the strength of the U.S. dollar and geopolitical issues,” SF Travel said in a release announcing its updated forecast.
The global data firm Tourism Economics has revised its earlier forecast of an 8.8% increase in foreign travel to the U.S. in 2025 with a new projection of a 5.1% decrease, a $64B shortfall, The Washington Post reported.
Tourism Economics said the downturn reflects “polarizing policies and rhetoric,” including an escalating trade war and tightening restrictions on U.S. border crossings and visas that have persuaded an increasing number of foreign visitors to cancel plans to come to America.
There has been a steep drop in the number of visitors from Canada, the leading source of international travel to the U.S., since President Trump declared he wants to make our northern neighbor the “51st State,” and former prime minister Justin Trudeau responded by urging Canadians not to vacation in the United States.
The number of Canadian visitors driving back from visits to the U.S. dropped by 23% in February, while air travel from the U.S. was down 13% compared with a year earlier, according to government figures from Statistics Canada. Tourism Economics is projecting a 15% decline in travel from Canada to the U.S. this year, equivalent to $3.3B in lost spending.
SF Travel is projecting modest increases this year for hotel occupancy, average daily rate (ADR) and revenue per available room (RevPAR) in San Francisco, with occupancy expected to hit 64.4%, a 2.3% year-over-year increase over 2024; ADR to tick up to $233 from $228; and RevPAR to come in at $150, a 4.8% year-over-year increase.
“The growth we’re forecasting this year is a direct result of more event planners choosing San Francisco,” SF Travel President and CEO Anna Marie Presutti said in a statement.
During a recent earnings call, the city's largest owner of hotel properties expressed optimism that a recovery is accelerating the city’s lodging sector.
Jon Bortz, CEO of Pebblebrook Hotel Trust, a Maryland-based REIT that owns seven full-service hotels in San Francisco, said he expects this year’s resurgence in conference business will continue to grow.
“The pace right now has significantly increased over the last six months for years, including 2026, 2027, and 2028.” Bortz said during the call. “We think the convention room-night demand is going to go up in each subsequent year based upon where they are from a pace perspective.”
Source: GlobeSt/ALM