Research · Updated October 2026
AI in UK Hospitality: Research and Statistics (2026)
A UK-focused summary of the published research on how hospitality businesses and their guests use AI. Every figure links to its source, date and sample, with what it means for independent restaurants, pubs, hotels and B&Bs.
- Last reviewed 27 October 2026
- 40+ sourced figures
Key findings
The picture at a glance
Only 26% of leaders feel equipped to deploy AI at scale (CGA by NIQ & Sona), and 26% of consumers now name AI apps like ChatGPT among their go-to sources for researching venues, almost level with Google Maps (Reputation & CGA by NIQ).
Adoption
How many UK hospitality businesses use AI?
Roughly a quarter to a third of UK hospitality operators are actively using AI, below the 29% average for all UK businesses. There is no official hospitality-only figure, but ONS data places accommodation and food services among the lowest-adopting sectors, and industry surveys find around 28% of operators using AI across several departments (ONS; Access Hospitality via Price Bailey).
The main reason is structure: 99.6% of the UK’s 176,685 hospitality businesses are SMEs (cited by NFON), and AI use falls sharply with business size. Adoption is also widening rather than deepening: the typical adopter uses only about 1.6 AI technologies (ONS).
Sources: ONS Business Insights and Conditions Survey, June 2026; Access Hospitality 2026
Current use
What do hospitality businesses use AI for?
Mostly data and marketing work. Operational uses lag far behind, and stock optimisation is used by just one operator in eight (CGA by NIQ & Sona).
Share of hospitality leaders using AI for each task. Source: CGA by NIQ & Sona Business Confidence Survey, leaders across 13,000+ venues.
The gap matters because stock, waste, labour and purchasing are where margins are won or lost, and they depend on clean, connected data. Access Hospitality found UK operators juggle an average of four systems and lose around 286 hours a year switching between them (Access Hospitality 2025). Read our guide to AI for stock and waste control.
What AI-using guests check before a visit. Source: Zonal & NIQ GO Technology report, October 2026, 5,000+ GB consumers.
Guest behaviour
How do guests use AI to choose where to eat, drink and stay?
About one in five British consumers already uses AI to plan a hospitality visit, and for travel, 52% of UK travellers now use AI to plan trips (Zonal & NIQ; MMGY via Hospitality Net).
AI is reshaping reviews too: 60% of consumers trust AI-generated review summaries and 37% have used AI for personalised recommendations (Reputation & CGA by NIQ). Yet when Lighthouse tested 4,545 ChatGPT prompts, most hotels did not appear at all (Hospitality Net).
Barriers
What stops hospitality businesses adopting AI?
Cost pressure
53% of leaders have cancelled some investment plans (CGA by NIQ & Sona).
Confidence and skills
Only 26% of leaders feel equipped to implement AI at scale.
Vendor-led learning
Most operators learn about AI from online research (47%) and technology vendors (37%), not independent advice.
Disconnected systems
Unlinked EPOS, booking, rota and accounts systems make reliable forecasting and stock control hard.
What it means for you
Five takeaways for independent operators
- Start with the data you already have. EPOS, booking and rota history can power forecasting before you buy anything new.
- Target the under-used areas. Stock, waste and rotas offer margin gains because few competitors use AI there yet.
- Make your venue AI-discoverable. Keep menus, prices, opening hours and reviews accurate everywhere guests and AI assistants look.
- Protect guest data. See our guest data, AI and UK GDPR checklist.
- Connect before you automate. Read do you need an ERP before AI?
The data
AI in UK hospitality: full statistics table
Click a number to link to that statistic. Figures come from different surveys with different samples, dates and definitions, so compare them with care.
| # | Topic | Statistic | Source | Date | Sample |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Business adoption | 29% of UK businesses used at least one AI technology in June 2026 – up 8 percentage points in a year and roughly triple the late-2023 level. | ONS BICS | Jun 2026 | UK businesses (BICS) |
| 2 | Business adoption | 28% of businesses with 0–9 employees use AI, against 49% of businesses with 250+ employees. | ONS BICS | 2026 | UK businesses (BICS) |
| 3 | Business adoption | Information and communication leads at around 58% adoption; accommodation and food services is among the lowest-adopting industries. | ONS BICS | 2026 | UK businesses (BICS) |
| 4 | Business adoption | Adoption is widening, not deepening: a typical adopting business uses only about 1.6 AI technologies. | ONS | 2026 | UK businesses (BICS) |
| 5 | Sector profile | 99.6% of the UK’s 176,685 hospitality businesses are small or medium-sized enterprises (March 2025). | Cited in NFON, Adoption Without Depth | 2026 | Official business counts |
| 6 | Operator intent | 72% of hospitality leaders say they are likely to introduce AI within the next 12 months; 58% feel positive about it. | CGA by NIQ & Sona Business Confidence Survey | Late 2025 | Leaders across 13,000+ venues |
| 7 | Operator readiness | Only 26% of hospitality leaders feel equipped to implement AI at scale. | CGA by NIQ & Sona | Late 2025 | Leaders across 13,000+ venues |
| 8 | Barriers | 53% of hospitality leaders have cancelled some investment plans because of cost pressures. | CGA by NIQ & Sona | Late 2025 | Leaders across 13,000+ venues |
| 9 | Current use | Top uses: data tasks such as forecasting and reporting (49%), marketing materials (47%), reports (45%), emails (43%); shift scheduling, marketing strategy and HR about 27% each; stock optimisation 12%. | CGA by NIQ & Sona | Late 2025 | Leaders across 13,000+ venues |
| 10 | Knowledge | 76% understand more about AI than a year ago – mainly via online research (47%) and technology providers (37%); 27% via consultants. | CGA by NIQ & Sona | Late 2025 | Leaders across 13,000+ venues |
| 11 | Operator adoption | 28% of UK and Ireland operators are implementing AI across multiple departments; a further 20% are exploring it. | Access Hospitality 2026 (reported by Price Bailey) | 2026 | UK & Ireland operators |
| 12 | Systems | UK hospitality businesses regularly use an average of four systems (five in Ireland) and lose about 286 hours a year switching between them. | Access Hospitality, AI in Hospitality Report 2025 | Aug 2025 | 400 UK & Ireland businesses |
| 13 | Expected benefits | Operators expect AI to help most with efficiency (45%), streamlining bookings (40%) and routine tasks and reporting (38%). | Access Hospitality 2025 | Aug 2025 | UK & Ireland businesses |
| 14 | Guest behaviour | 19% of British consumers already use AI tools to plan a visit to a pub, bar or restaurant; 50% are considering it. | Zonal & NIQ, GO Technology | Oct 2026 | 5,000+ GB consumers |
| 15 | Guest behaviour | AI-using guests check reviews (45%), prices (43%), menus (38%), opening times (35%) and deals (28%). | Zonal & NIQ, GO Technology | Oct 2026 | 5,000+ GB consumers |
| 16 | Discovery | 26% of consumers name AI apps such as ChatGPT among the sources they are most likely to use to research venues – close to Google Maps (27%) and ahead of Bing/Yahoo (14%). | Reputation & CGA by NIQ | 2025 | UK consumers |
| 17 | Reviews | 60% of consumers trust AI-generated review summaries; 13% trust them more than individual reviews. | Reputation & CGA by NIQ | Oct 2025 | UK consumers |
| 18 | Reviews | 51% would be likely to leave a review if an AI tool asked them in the right tone at the right moment. | Reputation & CGA by NIQ | Oct 2025 | UK consumers |
| 19 | Personalisation | 37% of guests have used an AI tool to get recommendations tailored to their preferences. | Reputation & CGA by NIQ | Oct 2025 | UK consumers |
| 20 | Travel planning | 52% of UK travellers use AI for trip planning, up 12 percentage points year on year. | MMGY Travel Intelligence (reported by Hospitality Net) | 2026 | UK travellers |
| 21 | AI visibility (global) | In 4,545 ChatGPT prompts across nine destinations, most hotels did not appear in the answers at all. | Lighthouse (reported by Hospitality Net) | 2026 | ChatGPT prompt test |
| 22 | Guest attitudes (global) | 76% of frequent hospitality guests are comfortable with AI tailoring their experience; 53% say technology improves their visit. | Access Hospitality 2025 | Aug 2025 | 8,000 consumers in six markets incl. UK |
Fact-check
Numbers we deliberately don’t repeat
These figures circulate widely but don’t disclose their sample or method, so we leave them out. NFON’s Adoption Without Depth report applies a similar test.
Not verified
“98% of hotel owners use some form of AI.”
No disclosed sample, method or definition of “some form of AI”.
Not verified
“Hotels using AI cut costs by 30% within six months.”
A vendor marketing claim with no baseline or sample.
Not verified
“Machine-learning forecasting lifts RevPAR by 8–14%.”
No published method, control group or sample.
Not verified
AI-in-hospitality market-size forecasts
One report puts “AI in hospitality” at about $0.37bn for 2026, another puts “AI in hospitality and tourism” at about $26.5bn. That’s roughly 70 times apart, down to definitions.
FAQs
More questions about AI in hospitality
Is AI search replacing Google for finding restaurants and pubs?
Not yet, but it is catching up: 26% of consumers name AI apps among their most likely sources for researching venues, against 27% for Google Maps. Most people use both, so your information needs to be accurate in each.
Which AI statistics about hospitality can I trust?
Prefer official statistics (such as ONS) and surveys that disclose their sample size, date and who was asked. Be cautious with round-number ROI claims from vendors and with market-size forecasts, which vary enormously by definition.
Is there research on AI in independent hotels?
Yes. Buell Hospitality, with UKHospitality and partners, is running a recurring study of over 20,000 independent hotel owners and operators, repeated every six months (Caterer Licensee). We will add its findings here as they are published.
About the author
Gaurav Kathuria, MBA, CMgr, MCMI
Founder of Hospitality Simplified. A digital transformation consultant with a background in IT service management, business process improvement and system implementation, he helps UK hospitality businesses adopt AI and ERP in a practical, data-first way. He reviews this page quarterly.
How to cite this page
Use our figures
Hospitality Simplified (2026). AI in UK Hospitality: Research and Statistics (2026). Last reviewed 27 October 2026. https://hospitalitysimplified.co.uk/ai-in-hospitality-research
To cite one figure, link to its row, for example …/ai-in-hospitality-research#stat-1. Journalists and researchers are welcome to contact us for comment.
Sources and methodology
Where these figures come from
We include official statistics and named surveys that disclose when and whom they asked. Where we rely on a secondary report, we name the original study. Global figures are labelled as such.
- Office for National Statistics: Artificial intelligence in UK businesses, 2023 to 2026
- CGA by NIQ & Sona: Business Confidence Survey (reported by Hotel Owner)
- Zonal & NIQ: GO Technology report, October 2026
- Access Hospitality: AI in Hospitality Report 2025 (via ResDiary)
- Price Bailey: The future of AI in UK hospitality (citing Access Hospitality 2026)
- Reputation & CGA by NIQ: UK consumer research (reported by the Craft Guild of Chefs)
- Reputation: How AI and the economy are reshaping UK food and beverage
- Hospitality Net: MMGY Travel Intelligence and Lighthouse findings
- NFON: Adoption Without Depth, United Kingdom
- Caterer Licensee: Buell Hospitality independent hotels AI study
Where does your business stand?
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