LAS VEGAS—A trip to this desert city once meant dirt-cheap hotel rooms and buffets, all subsidized by gambling revenue. Now visitors organize their trips around big-ticket events—and pay top dollar for everything else while they are in town.
Postpandemic Las Vegas is built to cater to the well-off. Hotel rates have risen faster than in any other major market in the U.S. New venues are drawing visitors to town for pro football, concerts and Formula One racing. A $26 bottle of water went viral last year.
Not long ago, lower- and middle-income families and young partyers on tight budgets made up most of the visitors to Las Vegas. In 2019, 28% of visitors lived in households earning six figures, according to the city’s visitors authority. Last year, 75% were in that income bracket.
Starting in the 1990s, Ed Schaplow, who lives in Chelan, Wash., visited Vegas twice a year, once for work and once for fun. He runs three small businesses, including a fruit farm. He and his wife could put together a five-night trip, including flights, meals and multiple shows, for under $1,000.
Their last visit was in 2023, when they stayed at the budget hotel Circus Circus. Even then, Vegas was starting to become out of reach. Schaplow was surprised by the hotel’s resort fee (now $45 per night plus tax) and the high cost of everyday items across the city. They could afford only one performance, a little-known act at a casino.
The couple looked into visiting last fall but were deterred by the prices for airfare and hotel. “We just wrote it off as it’s not worth it,” Schaplow said.
Las Vegas usually reflects the American economy—and then some. Few places were hit harder by the 2008-09 financial crisis or the early Covid lockdowns. The city rebounded thanks to the YOLO travel-and-spending boom that followed.
Now Las Vegas, like the economy more broadly, is increasingly dependent on spending by a smaller group of well-off people who are often invested in the booming stock market. Nationally, households earning more than $125,000 a year spent nearly 8% more in March than they did in January 2023, adjusted for inflation, according to the New York Fed. Those earning under $40,000 spent about 2% more.
The number of visitors to Las Vegas fell 7.5% in 2025, largely because of declines in lower-income and Canadian visitors, according to the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority. Statewide revenue from baccarat, a game popular with wealthy people, doubled in the past year, while slot-machine revenue rose 5.5%.
Steve Hill, president and CEO of the visitors authority, points to gloomy consumer sentiment to explain the drop in visitors. “Discretionary purchases are going to take a back seat, and Vegas is a very discretionary decision,” he said.
At the lower-end Plaza Hotel and Casino downtown, where rooms are an average of $110 a night including a resort fee, the number of visitors is down about 3% this year, though the ones who do come are still spending on gambling and dining.
The people who aren’t showing up are international visitors and those who drive into town. “That’s someone sitting in California or Arizona saying ‘Let’s drive to Vegas for the weekend.’ We’re not seeing that like we used to,” said Jonathan Jossel, the hotel’s CEO.
Meanwhile, the high-end Wynn Resorts, where the average daily rate in Vegas is $592, is thriving as the richest customers spend freely. A measure of profit per-hotel-room there rose from $87 per room in 2019 to $190 in 2025. Executives told investors on the company’s recent earnings calls that they can make more money by charging fewer customers more for hotel rooms. They have said the property is getting a boost from visitors who have made money from the artificial-intelligence boom.
“There’s not that much resistance to price at this point,” Brian Gullbrants, chief operating officer for North America, said on the May call.
Earlier this year, Zachary Hinckley enjoyed the $26 avocado toast at the Wynn’s Terrace Pointe Café with his son and son’s fiancé. Hinckley, 49, who owns a landscaping company in the Salt Lake City area, browsed Rolex watches at the hotel mall afterward, but didn’t find the one that he wanted.
Hinckley’s family was visiting for a daughter’s cheerleading competition and stayed in a rental home off the Strip. Hinckley visits at least once a year, but he doesn’t gamble and spends his time at nicer properties. “We live in nice homes, I don’t want to go to a dump in Vegas and smell cigarette smoke from 1974,” he said.
To meet the strong demand from the wealthiest customers, Caesars just remodeled its two palatial presidential suites and 29 “sky villas” that start at $1,500 a night for a one-bedroom. They toned down the Vegas kitsch when redecorating.
“A little Greek key is OK. But you don’t need a Roman warrior in the corner,” joked Sean McBurney, the company’s chief commercial officer and Las Vegas regional president. Statues remain ubiquitous in the hotel’s common areas.
Las Vegas once offered cheap hotel rooms and buffets as loss leaders to lure gamblers into casinos. But gambling is a less important source of revenue for the city, which is making more money from events, restaurants and shopping. About 26% of revenue comes from gambling now, said Chad Beynon, a gaming industry analyst at Macquarie.
Some hotels are trying to offer more affordable options after the uproar over the $26 bottle of water from the Aria minibar. (In response, the CEO of operator MGM Resorts International Bill Hornbuckle last year said “shame on us.”)
Some lower-end properties on the Strip are rolling out all-inclusive packages for room, meals and other amenities. And even the nicest hotels can be a deal in the offseason. On a summer weekday, visitors willing to endure 100-plus degree temperatures can often snag a room at a five-star property for under $150 a night, not including resort fees.
But the factors keeping budget travelers away are multiplying. Higher gas prices make a drive from California or Arizona more expensive. The demise of Spirit Airlines earlier this year eliminated many of the cheapest flights to the city.
At the same time, Vegas has pivoted toward more upscale offerings. The 2023 opening of the Sphere, where musical acts perform alongside cutting-edge visual effects in an immersive dome, accelerated the city’s transformation into an events-driven town. The venue, which has hosted U2 and Phish, is the highest-grossing arena in the world.
The Formula One motor sports race came to the city that same year, offering many tiers of tickets that run into the thousands of dollars. (Last year, their cheapest $50 tickets and their most expensive tickets which cost more than $27,000 were the first to sell out).
The Sphere set a high bar for other entertainment venues in the city, said Marc Badain, who oversaw building Allegiant Stadium, which opened in 2020 and is home to the NFL’s Las Vegas Raiders.
Badain is president of the Athletics, the Major League Baseball team building a new stadium on the Strip, scheduled to open in 2028. About 22% of seats will have access to premium areas such as lounges. The seats already on sale are selling briskly, he said.
Hiram Louie, 65, flew in from California right before Memorial Day weekend to see K-pop act BTS at Allegiant Stadium with his wife and daughter.
When he last visited in 2004, he spent much of the trip wandering around the Strip. This time, they paid more than $300 each for concert tickets. Dinner at a nice restaurant was $150 per person. They tried to visit a BTS pop-up shop with a long line, but realized they couldn’t get in without a reservation. In all, the trip ran about $4,000.
Write to Rachel Louise Ensign at Rachel.Ensign@wsj.com
