The U.S. hotel industry set an all-time ADR record of $179.30 for the week of 13–19 September 2026, according to CoStar's latest weekly performance read.

ADR climbed 5.7% year-over-year. Revenue per available room rose 10.4% to $127.43, and occupancy added 4.4% to reach 71.1%. "The U.S. ADR level was the highest for any week on record," CoStar said.

What does this change for operators?

Three numbers tell one story in three units. Occupancy counts the rooms sold. ADR prices them. RevPAR multiplies the two, so it captures both levers at once. A 10.4% RevPAR lift on a 5.7% ADR bump means rate is doing most of the work, not volume — and that's where margin lives.

Stack that against 2025 and you get a clean win: more rooms sold, at higher rates, producing more revenue per available key. It also tells you the week isn't an outlier. Convention-driven markets can spike 30% in RevPAR and then give it back the next week. This read looks broader than that.

Where the demand landed

Chicago did the heavy lifting among the Top 25 Markets. ADR there rose 28.2% to $257.66, the largest single-market ADR gain in the cohort. RevPAR jumped 41.8% to $226.18, also the top print. CoStar pins the surge on the International Manufacturing Technology Show (IMTS), a biennial trade exhibition.

That's a one-event read. Two weeks from now, Chicago's numbers will likely fade toward their underlying trend.

Washington, D.C. ran second. Occupancy rose 10.7% to 82.3%, the largest occupancy gain among major markets. RevPAR climbed 23.9% to $194.23, the second-largest RevPAR gain in the Top 25. D.C. occupancy above 82% is a compression reading — the kind of night when walk-ins get turned away at the desk.

Is this a national story or just two big cities?

Twenty-one of the Top 25 Markets still posted RevPAR gains. The release doesn't name the four that lagged. But when 21 of 25 markets lift at the same time, the breadth signals that convention calendars alone aren't carrying the result.

CoStar's weekly reads lean on a 95,000-property, 12.2-million-room sample worldwide, which helps temper noise from any single market.

What's the read under the headline?

The weekly release doesn't break out chain-managed versus franchised performance, or segment rates by chain scale. Operators looking for a brand-level cut will have to wait for monthly STR data.

ADR records are the harder signal. Once owners push rate, they rarely walk it back. Even soft weeks after IMTS typically clear above last year's print.

What to watch next

The next CoStar weekly lands in seven days. If IMTS spillover fades and D.C. occupancy steps off its 82.3% peak, headline ADR will almost certainly drop below $179.30. The pricing power behind that record, though, looks durable heading into the fourth quarter — and likely into 2027.