Skip to main content

What Is ADR?

ADR (Average Daily Rate) is the average price your hotel actually receives per sold room — the single most direct measure of how well your rate positioning is working.

The Definition

ADR = Total Room Revenue ÷ Number of Rooms Sold for a given period.

Note the denominator: rooms sold, not rooms available. ADR ignores rooms you didn't sell. That's intentional — ADR answers "when I sold a room, what did I get for it?" not "how much revenue per available room?" (That's RevPAR — different metric, different question.)

ADR is a pricing signal. It moves when your rate strategy moves: dynamic pricing, package mix, channel-mix shifts, seasonal adjustments. It doesn't move with occupancy alone.

A Worked Example

You operate a 20-room property. In June, you sold 432 room-nights. Total room revenue was $51,840.

Total Room Revenue = $51,840
Rooms Sold = 432
ADR = $51,840 ÷ 432 = $120

If next June you generate $54,432 from 432 room-nights (same volume), ADR rose to $126 — a 5% lift achieved purely through pricing, not through selling more rooms. That's $2,592 more revenue with zero additional operational cost.

ADR vs RevPAR vs ARR

The three rate metrics that hoteliers confuse most often:

Metric Formula What It Measures
ADRRoom Revenue ÷ Rooms SoldAverage price per sold room (pricing signal)
RevPARRoom Revenue ÷ Rooms AvailableRevenue per available room (blended performance)
ARRSame as ADR (older term)Average Room Rate — synonym for ADR, used interchangeably

If a vendor or report uses "ARR," they mean ADR. Track ADR + Occupancy → RevPAR follows automatically.

How to Raise ADR Without Hurting Occupancy

The trap with ADR is that the easiest way to lift it (raise rates across the board) is also the easiest way to crash occupancy. The five levers below raise ADR with minimal occupancy risk:

  1. Dynamic pricing on high-demand dates. When booking pace exceeds 85% by checkout-day-minus-7, raise rates 5-10%. The remaining bookings are inelastic — guests already committed to your property as their choice. This is the highest-leverage single lever.
  2. Tighten cancellation policy on peak dates. Non-refundable rates capture committed demand at a small ADR discount (typically 8-12%) but eliminate the chargeback / re-resell cost, lifting effective revenue. Use only on the dates you'll fill anyway.
  3. Package ancillaries into the room rate. Breakfast, late checkout, room upgrades, parking. A "Stay + Breakfast" package at $135 effectively raises ADR from $120 to $135 while delivering $8 in actual breakfast cost — net ADR lift of $7 per package booking.
  4. Tilt inventory mix toward premium room categories. Yield-manage by holding back standard rooms on dates you'll fill anyway, pushing guests into deluxe or suite categories. Even a 10% mix shift can lift property-wide ADR by 5-8%.
  5. Reduce dependency on discount-heavy OTA promotions. Pull stop-sells on the lowest-yield channels first when demand is healthy. The bookings you lose are typically the lowest-ADR ones; net ADR rises.

ADR Benchmarks (2026, Indicative)

Benchmarks vary by market, segment, and season. Indicative 2026 ranges for independent properties:

  • Budget independent (USA / Europe): $50-90
  • Mid-tier urban boutique: $130-220
  • Luxury boutique tier-1 city: $300-600+
  • Beach / island resort, peak: $250-700+
  • Indian tier-1 city hotel (under 50 rooms): ₹3,500-7,000
  • Maldives resort, peak season: $900-3,500
  • Bali villa (private pool): $200-500

The right benchmark for your property is (a) your own ADR last year same month, and (b) your direct competitive set (the 4-6 properties guests actually choose between when picking yours). Anything else is rough sanity-checking.

See Your ADR Live

Frontdesko's reporting dashboard tracks ADR daily, weekly, monthly with year-over-year and compset views. Free up to 5 rooms.

Start Free 14-Day Trial