The UAE's hotel sector saw occupancy and revenue per available room fall through the first half of 2026, even as Dubai and Abu Dhabi kept adding rooms to their inventories and pushed harder to attract resident travellers from the UAE and wider GCC.
Across the country, year-to-date occupancy through June 2026 averaged 57.9 percent, a decline of 22.2 percentage points compared with the same period last year. Revenue per available room, or RevPAR, reached AED394.2 for the year to date, down 31.8 percent annually. In June alone, national occupancy stood at 52.8 percent, a 16.5 percentage point drop from the previous year.
Abu Dhabi holds a firmer occupancy rate
Abu Dhabi's hotels performed relatively better than the national average. Occupancy in June 2026 reached 65.2 percent, though RevPAR was still down 12.1 percent compared with the same month last year. Looking at the full first half of the year, Abu Dhabi's year-to-date occupancy came in at 66.8 percent, while RevPAR fell 20.3 percent annually.
The emirate had roughly 33,650 hotel keys as of the second quarter of 2026, with about 120 additional rooms expected to open by the end of the year.
Dubai's occupancy and rates both soften
Dubai's numbers showed a steeper pullback. Year-to-date occupancy through June stood at 56.4 percent, a decline of 24.6 percentage points from the previous year. RevPAR for the period came to AED395.7, down 35.2 percent, while average daily rate slipped 7 percent to AED701.1.
Despite the softer performance metrics, Dubai's hotel inventory kept growing. The emirate held approximately 159,300 keys as of the second quarter of 2026, with around 4,900 additional rooms expected to be completed during the year.
To support tourism businesses navigating the slower period, Dubai introduced an AED2.5 billion support package. It included exemptions from the Tourism Dirham fee as well as certain hotel, restaurant, holiday-home and event-related charges, aimed at easing cost pressure on operators across the sector.
Ras Al Khaimah bucks the rate trend
Ras Al Khaimah stood out for a different reason. While its year-to-date occupancy fell 23.3 percentage points to 49.3 percent, its average daily rate actually rose 5.2 percent to AED705.6, one of the few upward movements recorded across the emirates covered.
Operators lean on resident travellers
With international demand patterns shifting, hotel operators across the UAE increased their focus on resident travellers from the UAE and GCC, rolling out discounted rates, staycation bundles and other package offerings designed to keep beds filled locally rather than relying solely on international arrivals.
Some properties also used the quieter seasonal period to their advantage, scheduling renovation work and temporary closures to complete upgrades before demand picks up again.
Taken together, the figures paint a picture of a sector still expanding its physical footprint, particularly in Dubai and Abu Dhabi, even as underlying occupancy and rate performance cools compared with last year's levels.