With the 2026 FIFA World Cup soccer tournament roughly 10 weeks from kicking off, the U.S. hotel industry's hopes for a blockbuster summer are fading, as a wave of hotel block cancellations tempers optimism.
Ed Grose, CEO of the Greater Philadelphia Hotel Association, said FIFA canceled roughly 2,000 contracted room nights in Philadelphia alone, while confirming similar cancellations have hit all 16 host markets across the U.S., Canada and Mexico.
Grose called the cancellations "disappointing" and said that "changes of this magnitude present challenges."
"Despite these reductions in Philadelphia, we remain optimistic," he said. The association is hopeful that the released rooms will be absorbed in part by two citywide conventions in June.
Evan Saunders, senior vice president of travel at location intelligence platform Azira, confirmed that the impact of FIFA's room block cancellations has been widespread, with some hotels reporting cancellation rates exceeding 95%.
"Tens of thousands of room nights, vanished," he said. "That's not just lost room nights. That's people dining, taking taxis and Ubers, shopping, buying gifts, hosting corporate events. There's a whole economy that's evaporated."
A FIFA spokesperson, however, said the room block situation is in line with standard practice.
Jan Freitag, national director of hospitality market analytics at CoStar, said hotels generally expect a portion of rooms held for major events to go unused, but the scale of FIFA's cancellations appears to have caught some hoteliers off guard.
The sentiment is also reflected in recent survey data from the American Hotel and Lodging Association. Its Front Desk Feedback report polled 246 hoteliers in late February, indicating that nearly 20% of properties in applicable U.S. markets said their 2026 World Cup bookings were running below expectations.
Freitag pointed to several factors that could be dampening demand, including an expanded 48-team field. Small nations like Cape Verde and Curacao, which likely wouldn't have qualified for the World Cup when it was a 32-team tournament, are unlikely to draw a lot of fans.
Visa access also is a friction point, he said, while the sheer size of the U.S. makes multicity journeys logistically and financially challenging. Also, the Iran war may be a factor, sparking negative consumer sentiment toward the U.S. and causing higher airfares from rising oil prices.
Scott Yesner, founder of Bespoke Stay, a Philadelphia-based property management company that manages roughly 100 short-term rentals and several boutique hotels, said the number of fans needing a hotel room might have been overestimated.
Philadelphia's Lincoln Financial Field accommodates nearly 70,000 people, and based on patterns from past FIFA tournaments, roughly half of them will be locals or regional daytrippers, he said. Of the remaining 35,000, Yesner said about half will opt for short-term rentals, leaving around 12,500 to 15,000 people seeking hotel rooms. At two guests per room, that works out to approximately 7,500 hotel rooms needed per match in a market with around 30,000 hotel rooms.
"People weren't totally understanding how many people these matches would bring in," Yesner said.
He said Philadelphia hotels might have mistakenly expected they could "name their own price," expecting a similar demand environment as when the pope visited in 2015, the NFL held its draft in 2017 or for a Taylor Swift concert.
Also, there are signs that visitors don't plan to stay long. Saunders cited OTA data indicating the top hotel checkout day in host cities is the day of the game itself, with average hotel stays running roughly one to two nights.
Yesner said Bespoke Stay's Philadelphia reservations are averaging around two nights.
Therefore, Saunders cautioned against destinations and hotels marketing so heavily to World Cup visitors and letting summer tourists get lost in the shuffle.
"You do not want your tourists who normally come to be scared away because they think it will be so busy because of the World Cup," he said.
Yesner, however, is optimistic that last-minute bookings could move the needle.
"The 'Plan-it Pams' have booked, and now we're waiting for the 'Last Minute Charlies,'" said Yesner. "I'm not expecting anything meaningful to happen until the end of April, when I think we'll start to see more bookings come in."