STR: Expo 2020 drove Dubai hotel occupancy above 90% for the first time since 2007

Driven by the final weeks of Expo 2020, Dubai’s hotel industry reported its first month of 90% or better occupancy since 2007, according to preliminary March 2022 data from STR.

• Occupancy: 91.7%
• Average daily rate (ADR): AED891.46
• Revenue per available room (RevPAR): AED817.90

Like past renditions of Expo in Shanghai (2010) and Milan (2015), the end of the “mega event” proved to be the busiest for Dubai. The last time monthly occupancy in Dubai reached 90% was March 2007 when there were roughly 90,000 less rooms in the market. Additionally, the ADR level was Dubai’s second highest of the pandemic-era, behind December 2021 (AED948.56), and market RevPAR was the highest since December 2015.

When looking at daily data, occupancy was higher than 90% for 25 days during the month with a peak of 96.0% on 24 March.

All of STR’s COVID-19 analysis can be found here.