Artificial Intelligence (AI) is moving forward with hospitality, making it easier for staff to provide a human touch to guests while staff take over other operational processes. New research into both global hotel chains and independent characteristics reveals that AI adoption is expanding across the hospitality sector, but barriers remain, including strategy, skills and integration.
Two studies of AI and automation in H2C and cloud beds in hospitality: Navigating today's challenges, forming the AI Hospitality Revolution 2025 of Tomorrow's Benefits and Take-Up – presents an opinion on how hotel groups and independent operators approach AI differently.
Together, they capture the perspectives of 370 hoteliers around the world, covering luxury chains, medium-sized brands and small, independent hotels.
Chains see the lag in AI's potential, strategy and trust
According to a global survey by H2C, based on inputs from 171 hotel chains representing over 11,000 properties, 78% of the chains are already using AI, and 89% are expanding their applications in the next 12 to 24 months.
Chatbots dominate current usage (42%), and customer data management is the key area of planned investment (50%).
In particular, hotel reliance on AI has lagged behind their stated trust in technology. Hoteliers gave AI a trust score of 6.6 out of 10, but only averaged 4.7 in actual reliance on AI. This reflects the lack of formal strategies for AI adoption.
Only 7% of hotel chains report having a comprehensive, company-wide AI strategy. The barriers to hotel chains' adoption of AI are substantial.
- 62% cite lack of expertise
- 51% say their strategy is unknown
- 45% struggle with integration
- 39% cite high cost or budget constraints
Other hurdles to overcome include organizational resistance to change (31%), concerns about data security and privacy (30%), ROI and investment uncertainty (27%), and data quality and accessibility issues (26%).
“The adoption of hospitality AI is accelerating, but most hotel chains are still experimenting,” says Michaela Papenhoff, managing director at H2C. “Bringing the trust-dependent gap requires focusing on use cases that bring about better integration, clear ROI measurements and tangible value.”
Independents move faster with AI and see the benefits
When major brands are cautious, small operators show impressive agility in AI adoption.
A Takeup poll of 200 independent property owners and managers found that 74.5% of properties using AI reported positive results, while most (66%) use AI between six months and two years.
- 16.7% reported that automated guest communications brought the most value
- 13.8% benefit most from AI in optimizing marketing campaigns
- Using AI with dynamic pricing gives you 12.1% reporting
- Many (19.7%) cite time savings and efficiency as the biggest reasons for AI adoption, with cost savings (13.1%) and competitor advantage (10.12%) being key motivationalists.
Guest communications are the top adoption area (13.4%) followed by marketing and advertising (12.1%) and social media management (11.2%).
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The impact of AI recruitment revenues is also noteworthy. Of the properties reporting profits, 25.5% reported revenue growth of 6-10%, while 35% reported an increase of 11-20%.
“Independent property owners don't just dip their toes into AI, they jump in and win,” said Bobby Marhamat, CEO of Takup. “The fact that 74% of owners say AI meets or exceeds expectations will close the outdated myth that small assets cannot succeed with AI.”
Almost 70% of those surveyed believe that AI is essential to staying competitive, and 39% call it a major competitive advantage.
Common threads: efficiency, guest experience, human touch
Despite differences in scale, both studies emphasize the same motivation. Reduce repetitive tasks, improve efficiency, and improve guest experience.
For chains, business intelligence (78%), chatbots (77%) and digital marketing (72%) are ranked as the most valuable applications.
Independents, automated guest communications (16.7%), marketing campaign optimization (13.8%), dynamic pricing (12.1%) and energy cost reduction (12.1%) are top priorities.
In both cases, acceptance of AI staff is positive. A Takeup survey found that 78% of staff are somewhat or extremely comfortable with AI tools. Meanwhile, two-thirds of H2C respondents said that AI will release teams to focus on more strategic or guest-oriented work.
“I think people have very special skills, but in many cases they don't have the time or space to use them. With AI, they finally get back that time,” says an executive from the small chain who cited in the H2C study.
For both groups, the balance between automation and personal touch is still an important component of hospitality. Half of the chains (62% of the larger chains) and 74% of independents say it's important to maintain a personal touch.
“In hospitality, the human touch makes all the difference. Even if the task changes, humans continue to add the most value,” says the chain executive of the H2C research.
Still, traveller trends will drive the expansion of AI adoption. Over 60% of independents responding to take-up surveys reported that their guests appreciate or love AI-powered features.
AI from the perspective of hotel guests
Travelers are becoming more and more comfortable with AI. Phocuswright's study discovered in the “Chat, Planning. Book: Genai Goes Mainstream” study.
Adoption in other markets is also growing. In the UK, 41% of tourists surveyed said they used AI generated from 36% in 2024 and 14% in 2023.
- 33% of US travelers use generator AI tools (ChatGpt, Google Gemini, AI-powered search) to plan their trips and provide expected support during their trip
- 22% of UK travelers rely on AI for travel
- 22% of French travelers use AI for their travel purposes
- 15% of German travelers use AI tools for their travel
- Of travelers who actively use Genai, between 38% and 55% used it to plan at least one trip.
Perhaps not surprising, younger generations are more likely to use genai to plan their trips. Approximately 60% of millennials and young travelers in the US, UK and France use this technology. In comparison, Genx and baby boomers generally lag behind AI travel plans, with medians across all regions at 33%.
When it comes to finding your next hotel, 85% of US travelers trust AI to search.
And trust in AI is growing. A quarter to a third of travellers surveyed in four markets said they were interested in booking trips through the Genai engine, or leaving it to the AI assistant book if services are available.
AI-Answer Engine Provides Hotel Reservations
There are many applications in AI in the travel industry, and technology companies are also seeing growth opportunities in this area. As Phocuswire reported in May, the AI-powered Answer Engine Perplexity partnered with Selfbook and TripAdvisor to allow AI users to book hotels.
“We are introducing a bewildered answer mode to make our vertical core search products even better, such as travel, shopping, locations, images, videos, jobs, and more,” Aravind Srinivas, co-founder and CEO of bewildered, said in a LinkedIn post.
“The next step is to be very accurate [so] You do not need to press these tabs. ”
According to Srinivas, embarrassment is already pondering how to encourage reservation adoption. “We plan to bring some benefits to professional users, including discounts on hotel bookings that are made natively about the confusion, and we'll soon be talking about this.”
Moving from AI experiments to integration
For large hotel chains, the next challenge is moving beyond pilots to enterprise integration, with interest in automating robotic processes, proactive AI agents and digital identity verification. For independents, the expansion plan focuses on intelligent energy management, more guest communication automation, and advanced marketing tools.
Both studies suggest that early AI adopters in the hospitality field can gain a competitive advantage. For a global hotel group, just like family-owned accommodations, the key is to develop an AI strategy to tackle your business before it is done by competitors.
