Fewer International Guests Are Visiting US Hotels: How to Fill the Gap

If fewer international guests are booking your hotel, you are not imagining it. This guide sets out what the latest industry and government figures say, and how a hotel can fill the gap with guests who live closer. The figures come from CoStar, LARC and Statistics Canada, read on October 13, 2026.

How far have international visits to US hotels fallen?

Sources: LARC, 3Q-2026 outlook; CoStar and Tourism Economics, August 2026; Statistics Canada, July 2026.

Canada needs a closer look. Statistics Canada says Canadian return trips from the US rose 10.1% in July 2026, the fourth straight rise after 15 straight falls (Statistics Canada, July 2026). Yet they were still 25.6% below July 2024, and 59.8% of the car trips were same-day trips, which bring little hotel demand. Air trips, which more often include a hotel night (our reading), rose 0.6%, ending a 34-month streak of declines. Its preliminary August figure shows return trips up 8.8%, with air 22.7% and car 27.4% below August 2024 (Statistics Canada, August 2026).

Are more Americans staying home?

The data point that way. CoStar says US citizen outbound travel turned negative in recent months, which suggests more travelers are staying in the US, a tailwind for domestic hotel demand. LARC counts four straight monthly declines in US citizens traveling abroad through July, and says this has likely been fueled by the rising US dollar, the war with Iran and lower discretionary income. Neither says how much of this reaches independent hotels, so check your own domestic bookings.

How much did international guests matter to your hotel?

National figures cannot tell you. Pull a 12-month report from your property management system or booking engine: room nights by guest country, and by state for US guests. Compare it with the 12 months before. Two numbers decide whether this matters: the international share of your room nights, and how that share is changing.

Here is an illustrative case. A 60-room hotel at 62% occupancy and a $160 average rate earns about $2.17 million a year in room revenue. If international guests are 10% of it ($217,000) and that falls by 10%, the hotel loses about $21,700 a year. Winning that revenue back through a booking site at 25% costs about $5,400. At the 8% and 12% cost of a direct booking through MarginStay it would cost about $1,700 and $2,600.

How can a hotel fill the gap with domestic guests?

1. Find your top domestic markets. List the five states or metro areas your US guests come from. They are your first ad locations.
2. Add the cities within a day's drive. Guests who can drive need less planning time.
3. Set ad locations by where guests live. Google Ads lets you include or exclude people by where they are likely to be, or the places they have shown interest in, and by default includes both (Google Ads Help). Our guide to Google Ads for hotels explains which setting suits a hotel, and Facebook and Instagram ads for hotels covers Facebook and Instagram ads.
4. Email past domestic guests. They already know you. See email to past guests.
5. Show your own price on Google. Free booking links cost nothing per click; see Google's free booking links.
6. Keep your booking-site listings. International guests still find hotels there, and listings can lift other bookings (see the billboard effect).
7. Judge each market by cost per booking. See tracking which ad brought a booking for how to link each booking to its source.

What can ads not fix?

Ads move demand to your hotel, they do not create it. If your market leaned on one country, for example a border town that relied on Canadian visits, domestic guests may not replace all of it. Start with a small budget in two or three nearby markets and compare what each booking costs. To see what a booking that comes to your own website is worth, try our savings calculator. For the wider plan, read how independent hotels get more direct bookings.

MarginStay helps independent hotels bring in direct bookings through ads, so we have a stake in this topic. Figures come from the CoStar and LARC reports on Hospitality Net and from Statistics Canada, and the ad-location rule from Google Ads Help, all read on October 13, 2026. The 60-room example is illustrative and uses room revenue before taxes.