Published on 12/6/2026
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Last update: 08:09 (Mecca time)
The World Cup kicked off on Thursday after a long wait, but the expected recovery of the travel and tourism sector from the biggest sporting event of the year has not yet materialized.
For years, there has been an expectation that the tournament would bring huge gains to the American travel and tourism sector, which is currently suffering from a decline in the number of visitors from outside the United States.
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The crowds of fans that hotels were counting on have not yet arrived, forcing many to lower prices. Flight reservations declined in conjunction with the sharp rise in ticket prices.
Demand was also affected by the high prices for match tickets. Analysts from the sector say that enthusiasm for this event, which is awaited by hundreds of millions, is less compared to previous times.
This weak start indicates that the traditional travel strategy to attend World Cup matches, which usually depends on the willingness of fans from around the world to travel long distances and spend huge sums of money to support their national teams, is beginning to fade.
Instead of this traditional popularity, high costs, obstacles to obtaining entry visas, and logistical arrangements for attending matches in 16 host cities in three countries, all seemed to constitute a major obstacle to attracting the usual turnout.
In the United States, where football is less popular than Europe, domestic travel for Americans is not enough to fill this huge gap.
“It’s absolutely disappointing, I can’t find any other way to describe it,” said Vijay Dandapani, CEO of the New York City Hotel Association.
He added that the association reduced its expectations for hotel room revenues related to the World Cup by 60 percent to about $60 million.
The International Federation of Association Football (FIFA) declined to comment.
Last minute recovery
Travel and aviation data tracker Cirium data shows that bookings from Europe to most host cities in June and July fell by an average of 3.8 percent year-on-year, even after Europeans had already reduced their travel to the United States last year.
The data also indicated that bookings from Europe to New York, which will host the World Cup final on July 19, decreased by 15.8 percent.
FIFA expected 1.2 million fans to flock to the city, but Dhandapani said the New York Hotel Association expected only half a million.
Hotels hope to witness a noticeable recovery in last-minute reservations after the end of the group stage, despite these disappointing initial data.
Dandapani pointed out that a number of New York hotels offer discounts on rooms, such as the Hilton Midtown, the city’s largest hotel, which reduced its prices during the tournament by half, reaching $415 per night, compared to the prices announced in December.
Andy Milne, an English fan and author of That World Cup Guy, sees it as a matter of cost.
He said, “Some fans will not attend the World Cup at all… Some of my friends will go to Ibiza to watch all the matches on TV at an incomparably lower cost. Others will go to Las Vegas. That will also cost money, but it is much less than the cost of tickets, travel, hotels and transportation to the stadiums.”
Fans from more than half of the countries qualifying for the World Cup need visas to enter the United States, which increases costs and increases uncertainty for travelers who are already concerned about tightening border entry procedures.
FIFA’s ticketing practices have also upset some fans. The organizers imposed unprecedentedly high base prices and adopted for the first time a pricing system that raises prices as the tournament approaches. Prices increased after FIFA decided to allow the resale of tickets without a price ceiling, which required scrutiny from regulatory authorities.
According to the Ticket Data website, the price of the cheapest ticket in host cities such as New York and Miami is close to $1,000.
