Resurgence in full‑service projects in global construction pipeline

There are 6,195 projects/1,101,602 rooms currently under construction worldwide at Q1. Projects scheduled to start construction in the next 12 months stand at 3,840 projects/528,251 rooms, for an 8 per cent increase by projects and a 5 per centincrease by rooms YOY. Projects and rooms in the early planning stage are at all-time highs and stand at 5,331 projects/752,342 rooms at the Q1 close, increasing 12 per cent and 9 per cent YOY, respectively.

Notably, full-service branded and unbranded projects have experienced a resurgence, dominating the pipeline at Q1. At the close of the first quarter, luxury hotel projects and room counts reached record highs of 1,215 projects/239,744 rooms, a 12 per cent increase by projects and a 6 per cent increase by rooms YOY, upper upscale closed Q1 with 1,999 projects/445,207 rooms, up 7 per cent by projects and 5 per cent by rooms YOY, upscale hotel projects stand at a record 4,093 projects with 711,510 rooms, up 7 per cent by projects and 4 per cent by rooms YOY, and casinos increased 6 per cent by projects and 3 per cent by rooms YOY to stand at 53 projects/25,023 rooms.

Globally, the countries with the greatest number of full-service projects in the total pipeline at Q1 are led by the United States with 2,272 projects/341,854 rooms, accounting for 41 per cent of the projects in the total global full-service pipeline, then China with 1,688 projects/414,323 rooms. Distantly following is India with 334 projects/46,586 rooms. Next is Saudi Arabia with 270 projects/62,744 rooms, and Vietnam with 186 projects/61,426 rooms. These five countries combined, account for 86 per cent of the full-service projects in the total global pipeline.

Leading cities, worldwide, with the largest full-service pipeline totals at Q1 are Chengdu, China with 80 projects/21,130 rooms; Riyadh, Saudi Arabia with 75 projects/15,025 rooms; Dallas, Texas with 75 projects/10,434 rooms; Los Angeles, California with 68 projects/13,188 rooms, and Shanghai, China with 67 projects/16,569 rooms.

Globally, during the first quarter, 177 new full-service hotels opened, accounting for 32,611 rooms with upscale projects accounting for over 50 per cent of the openings. For the remainder of 2024 and through 2025, LE analysts expect upscale projects to continue to account for the majority of projects to open from the total full-service pipeline. Overall, however, throughout the next three quarters, LE forecasts an additional 952 new full-service hotels/181,148 rooms to open, totaling 1,129 new full-service hotels with 213,759 rooms to open by year-end 2024. Looking ahead, the LE forecast for new hotel openings expects another 1,260 new full-service hotels/244,275 rooms to open worldwide in 2025.