Horwath HTL’s India Hotel Market Review 2025 provides a year-end analysis of India’s hotel market performance, combining CoStar performance data with Horwath HTL’s supply research and market insights. The report reviews national trends and key city performance, highlights the opportunities and challenges shaping hotel owners, investors, developers and operators, and outlines how India’s hotel sector continues to grow despite global and domestic disruptions.

Historically, spas and gyms were considered an “amenity” or a nice-to-have perk intended to elevate the brand perception or to fulfil the “star rating” requirement. Today, the growing global emphasis in the post-COVID era on healthy lifestyles, work-life balance, mental wellbeing, and mindful living is driving increased spending on wellness services and retreat experiences.

Across the hospitality industry, the role of the Hotel General Manager (GM) has continued to expand in both scope and complexity over the years. Nowhere is this more visible than during regional or global GM conferences organised by international hotel groups, where General Managers gather to align on corporate direction and priorities.

In Kaiserslautern, ECE plans to convert vacant retail space in the “K in Lautern” mall into a 139-room hotel, raising concerns among existing hoteliers already facing low occupancy rates and recent competition from a 146-room Holiday Inn Express opened in 2023. The project highlights a critical question: who bears the risk of new hotel developments in markets with existing overcapacity, especially when hotel investments are difficult to reverse and failed projects can become permanent urban planning burdens?

Hotel profitability is under increasing pressure due to inflationary headwinds and payroll increases. Relying on traditional income sources is no longer enough: owners, operators and asset managers are now identifying alternative sources both within the hotel and around the site and available land. Strategic thinking on maximising revenue per square metre within the building footprint has led to some creative ideas which crucially do not impact the core business.