The U.S. tourism downturn is hitting some Nevada cities harder than others. What’s going on?
Las Vegas tourism hits a wall. Inside the numbers
The U.S. tourism downturn is impacting Nevada, with some cities being hit harder than others. What’s going on?
- A downturn in tourism is hitting the U.S. travel sector this year, including Nevada.
- The decline in tourism numbers is being attributed to several factors, from the end of post-COVID revenge spending to Trump administration policies for immigration and tariffs.
- In Nevada, the decline in tourism is especially hitting Las Vegas while tariff policy is having a more noticeable effect on the Reno area.
- The rural town of Virginia City is also seeing a decline in visitors from Canada and Mexico.
The throaty roar of classic car engines filled the air as a long line of chrome and candy-colored Americana drove through the Reno Arch just before sunset in early August.
For the thousands of drivers and spectators who flock to the Biggest Little City every summer, the “Supercruise” through downtown Virginia Street is a highlight of Hot August Nights. Since starting in 1986, the classic car festival has grown into one of the biggest draws on the Reno events calendar.
Hot August Nights also plays one more role besides stirring the hearts of gearheads. For decades, the event has been a barometer for tourism in the region.
In 2024, Hot August Nights boasted 6,000 classic car registrations, the maximum possible after it raised its cap from the previous limit of 5,500 as post-pandemic travel accelerated across the country. This year, however, devotees of the event eased off the gas pedal, with registrations falling short of the cap by 294 spots.
Organizers cited the move of its longtime main venue from the Grand Sierra Resort — which is starting work on a new arena — to the University of Nevada, Reno as one of the key challenges this year in organizing Hot August Nights.
Logistics, though, don’t tell the full story.
After seeing an increase in visitor counts during four of the first five months of 2025, Reno-Sparks kicked off the summer season in June with just a little over 357,000 visitors. The number was down by nearly 14,000 from the same period in 2024, according to public records requested by the Reno Gazette Journal from the Reno-Sparks Convention and Visitors Authority.
Just 30 miles away in the historic town of Virginia City, numbers were down not just for Hot August Nights but for tourism overall this year, according to the Virginia City Tourism Commission.
Then there’s the biggest city of them all in Nevada. Las Vegas saw a double-digit percentage drop in total visitors in June compared with last year. Passenger counts at Harry Reid International Airport are also down for the year, according to the latest data.
June and July were especially down, according to Elton Marvin, a bartender at the Las Vegas airport.
“It was noticeably slower this summer than it has been in previous summers,” Marvin said. “I look at it based on my tips and what I made last year and what I made this year, and those months were down about 25%.”
So what exactly is going on with tourism in Nevada?
Another ride on the Las Vegas tourism roller coaster
For decades, Las Vegas has cemented its reputation not just as a gaming destination but a place for big fights.
Today, Sin City finds itself as the favorite punching bag of online naysayers and social media influencers doomposting about its demise. The trend is not lost on those who analyze economic data in the state.
“Every day, it’s a hit piece on Vegas I see on the internet,” said Brian Bonnenfant, project manager at the Center for Regional Studies at the University of Nevada, Reno.
Search “Las Vegas” on YouTube and numerous videos about a “dying” or “deserted” city pop up.
On X, formerly known as Twitter, there is no shortage of people serving up theories about Las Vegas’ downfall, with jacked up costs for food and lodging plus the dreaded “r” word — resort fees — being especially popular targets. News outlets nationwide and even overseas are reporting on the “Sin City Slowdown” as well.
Although Marvin thinks all the “is Las Vegas dying?” talk is overblown, he agrees about the impact of higher costs, even for locals.
Marvin, who was born in Las Vegas and has lived in the area all his life, is still upset about several resorts taking away free parking. Dealing with traffic to get to the Las Vegas Strip is bad enough. But having to pay for parking on top of that adds insult to injury, he said.
“That’s the thing that killed it for the locals the most,” Marvin said. “I don’t want to go eat dinner, then go gambling and then lose more money … and then they hit you on the way out with 30 to 40 bucks for parking. It’s like, come on, bro.”
Jeremy Aguero, a principal analyst with Las Vegas-based data analysis and consultation firm Applied Analysis, urged calm, saying Las Vegas’ tribulations are the latest dip in the roller coaster that is Nevada’s tourism economy.
“The sky isn’t falling, all right?” Aguero said. “Tourism across the state of Nevada, including both Northern Nevada and Southern Nevada, has ebbed and flowed countless times over the past 50 years.”
At the same time, Aguero noted that the Las Vegas area is “showing some weakness” this year. That weakness is reflected in several key tourism numbers for the city.
- Visitor volume to Las Vegas has been down every month through the first half of this year, including a nearly 12% drop in February and an 11% decline in June compared with 2024, according to data from the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority. Overall, visitor counts are down by 7% for the first half of the year to just under 19.6 million people. July was no better, posting a 12% drop while August saw a 6.7% decline in visitor numbers as well.
- The downturn is also reflected in the number of rooms being booked in Las Vegas. After starting out flat in January, room nights — an indicator for hotel room occupancy — also saw declines for each month through June in Las Vegas, according to the LVCVA. Overall, occupied room nights were at 22.3 million for the first half of 2025, down nearly 6% from last year. July was even worse with a 7.6 percentage point drop in room occupancy from last year while August was down by 3.7 percentage points.
- Air travel to Las Vegas was down in June, falling by 6.3% to 4.7 million passengers from 5 million last year, according to data provided by Harry Reid International Airport. Las Vegas air travel is also down for the first half of the year by 4.1%, falling to 27.7 million passengers compared to 28.8 million during the first six months of 2024. The slide continued in July with a 5.7% drop in passenger counts to 4.77 million, followed by an 5.8% drop to 4.57 million in August, bringing the year-to-date total to 37 million passengers — a decrease of 4.5% compared to the same period last year.
Las Vegas remains a popular destination for events, however.
Convention attendance was one of the few bright spots in a sea of negative numbers for Las Vegas this year. The number of visitors attending conventions was up 1.5% for the first half of 2025 at 3.2 million. Convention attendance has been mixed since then, dropping by 11% year-over-year in June, then rallying with a 10.7% increase in July. Attendance, however, dropping again by 8% in August, bringing the year-to-date total to 4.10 million — up a half percent from the same period last year.
Steve Hill, president and CEO of the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority, pointed to outside factors for the bulk of the city’s tourism woes.
“Really, the first five months of the year are kind of mirroring the rest of the country,” Hill said.
Tourism and economic headwinds buffeting the U.S. tourism sector
Hill is referring to the overall slowdown seen this year in the U.S. tourism and aviation sector.
The World Travel & Tourism Council is expecting the U.S. economy to lose $12.5 billion in traveler spending in 2025. A big factor is the notable drop in visits from foreign travelers.
Global economic research and consulting firm Oxford Economics is forecasting an 8.2% decline in international arrivals to the United States this year, citing headwinds arising from poor traveler sentiment.
In August, Travel and Tour World reported that the country’s tourism and aviation industries are “facing a sharp economic slowdown” as a drop in travel from overseas locations such as Asia, Europe, Latin America and Africa is fueling reduced passenger traffic and spending.
The World Travel & Tourism Council and Travel and Tour World laid the blame on the chilling effect from policies enacted by the Trump administration. The policies include stricter immigration controls that have led to the detention of some travelers despite having valid visas.
The detentions have prompted countries such as the United Kingdom, Germany and Denmark to issue cautionary travel advisories to its citizens when traveling to the United States.
“This is a wake-up call for the U.S. government,” said Julia Simpson, president and CEO of the World Travel & Tourism Council.
“The world’s biggest (tourism) economy is heading in the wrong direction, not because of a lack of demand, but because of a failure to act. While other nations are rolling out the welcome mat, the U.S. government is putting up the ‘closed’ sign.”
Neighbors to the north staying home, selling U.S. properties
Negative reactions to President Donald Trump’s tariffs and other policies are also leading to calls for travel boycotts from places such as Canada.
Canadian snowbirds, who have seen Trump mention annexing their country as “the 51st state,” are pulling back not just from trips but from real estate holdings in the United States.
Warm-weather states such as Arizona and Florida are seeing a selloff of Canadian-owned properties. Scottsdale, Arizona, saw listings of Canadian-owned properties jump from 100 units in early 2024 to almost 700 in the first quarter of 2025, according to real estate firm CRE. Meanwhile, the number of new Canadian homebuyers fell by 40%.
Las Vegas is no exception.
Chad Roberts, a real estate agent with Realty ONE Group in Henderson near Las Vegas, had two Canadian clients sell their homes this year.
This year also kicked off with a significant drop in the number of Canadians searching for homes in Las Vegas, according to analysis by real estate company Redfin. Although it started with a small decrease of 3.6% in January compared to the same month last year, the declines jumped to double digits, starting with a 21% decrease in February and going all the way up to 34% by May. The sharper drops coincided with President Trump mentioning that he was serious about annexing Canada during a Super Bowl preshow in February.
One of those clients is Chris Higgins, a resident of London in Ontario. Higgins and his wife were worried about Trump hitting foreigners who own U.S. properties with additional fees or expenses.
“The reason we sold is (because Trump) was putting forward a lot of policies and we were worried that an alien who tries to sell their place may be charged extra taxes,” Higgins said. “We just didn’t want to take a chance on that.”
Domestically, uncertainties over economic issues such as inflation and tariffs are impacting consumer confidence. Consumer sentiment fell to a three-month low in August, according to the latest survey from the University of Michigan.
In addition to inflation, some of the consumers surveyed specifically mentioned the Bureau of Labor Statistics and the Federal Reserve. Trump fired BLS Commissioner Erika McEntarfer after the agency released a jobs report that was weaker than expected. Trump has also frequently expressed displeasure with Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell and recently ordered the firing of Fed Governor Lisa Cook.
The uncertainty over immigration and the U.S. economy is proving to be a one-two punch for Las Vegas tourism, with the LVCVA already projecting an especially challenging summer beforehand.
Las Vegas typically does not see as much business travel in the summer, which means it is heavily reliant on leisure travelers, according to LVCVA’s Hill. With consumer sentiment down, however, leisure travel was already expected to take a hit, which was reflected in the numbers from June to August.
The difficulties with domestic travel can be seen in this year’s airport passenger numbers for Harry Reid International Airport. While the number of international passengers fell by 2%, passenger counts for domestic flights saw an even bigger drop — down by nearly 5%.
“People are worried about their jobs or worried about their financial condition and they’re holding off on travel, including budget travelers,” Hill said.
“We don’t have as much business travel in the summer. We don’t have the same sports lineup in the summer that we have the other nine months of the year. So we are in a very discretionary travel market.”
What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas?
While Las Vegas has been hammered by the tourism downturn’s headwinds, its counterpart in the north is managing to weather the ongoing storm in better shape.
Despite mixed numbers so far this year, the Reno area remains in positive territory.
- Although visitor counts were down in June, the number of visitors for Reno-Sparks during the first half of 2025 was up overall by nearly 2% at nearly 1.84 million, according to Reno-Sparks Convention and Visitors Authority data. Even when adding visitor counts from July, which were down compared to last year, the overall numbers are still up for 2025 by about 27,000 visitors.
- Cash room nights — which refer to rooms that were paid for by customers and not comped — were also up for the first half of the year. Hotels in Reno-Sparks reported 1.5 million total room nights for the first six months of 2025, an increase of 1.4% from last year.
- Taxable revenue in the first half was also up by 2.5% year-over-year to $217.4 million.
Mike Larragueta, RSCVA president and CEO, says the Reno-Tahoe area’s recovery since the COVID-19 pandemic “has been among the best in the country.”
Laraguetta pointed to diverse attractions outside of gaming as well as lower costs.
“The Reno-Sparks-North Lake Tahoe tourism market is faring well in light of national indicators and industry trends,” Larragueta said. “The mix of outdoor adventure opportunities and the value this destination provides … has a broad appeal.”
The Reno area is not as dependent as Las Vegas on international tourism, which means overseas boycotts will not have as big an impact on its tourism, Larragueta said.
About a third of visitors to Reno-Tahoe come from its traditional “drive markets” in California, including Stockton, Sacramento and the Bay Area.
“Traditionally, only about 1% of Reno-Tahoe visitors come from outside the country,” Larragueta said.
The trends are also reflected by passenger traffic data for the Reno-Tahoe International Airport.
Although the Reno airport offers an international flight to Mexico via Volaris, domestic travel remains its bread-and-butter business. Just like domestic travel led the airport out of the COVID-19 pandemic slump, it is also keeping the airport in positive territory so far for the year.
With the exception of a slight 1% decrease in June, passenger counts for Reno-Tahoe International Airport have been up every month of the year, with August being the best month for passenger counts at the airport in 20 years.
Through August, the Reno airport saw 3.3 million total passengers, putting it on pace to reach 4.9 million by the end of the year. The number would represent an increase from 4.8 million for 2024.
“We’ve seen a notable increase in business and leisure travel from our local community, which shows that while tourism remains important to Reno-Tahoe, the mix of travelers coming through (the Reno airport) is evolving,” said Nicolle Staten, public affairs manager for the Reno-Tahoe Airport Authority.
“We’re currently trending toward surpassing last year’s total passenger numbers.”
Northern Nevada still not exempt from tourism slowdown
While the tourism downturn is not hitting Reno as strongly as Las Vegas, it does not mean that Reno is exempt from its impact.
Although Reno visitor counts and hotel room nights are up for the year, the tight gap between this year’s numbers and last year’s means it could still finish in negative territory if the coming months show a notable and consistent decrease.
One question is whether the ongoing challenges mean the typical slowdown in air travel during fall will be worse this year than last.
“We’re optimistic, but we want to be mindful not to celebrate too early,” Staten said.
Just because Northern Nevada does not rely on international travel as much as Las Vegas also does not mean it is exempt from its effects. In the rural town of Virginia City, tourism has been mixed for the first half of the year.
Visits from tourists coming from outside the local market are down by roughly 6% compared to two years ago while repeat visitor counts are down by 5%, according to Todd Tuttle, director of the Virginia City Tourism Commission.
One factor is a decrease in international travelers.
“We’ve had discussions with a lot of our Canadian partners and our Mexican partners … and they’re saying they’re having a hard time filling their buses to come this direction,” Tuttle said.
“We understand that, but we want to keep our relationship open so that when all of this settles down, we’ve got a great opportunity to grow with those markets again.”
Registrations for Hot August Nights’ two-day kickoff in Virginia City were also down from last year.
However, the former mining boomtown is seeing some positive trends.
While weekly visitation numbers are down, special event visits are up for the year. Attendance at this year’s Fourth of July event rose to 19,000 compared to 17,000 last year.
Even though Hot August Nights registrations did not surpass 2024’s, the 5,712 registrations are still the second-highest seen in the past five years, which have been especially challenging due to the pandemic.
“With the camaraderie that unfolds when these events go on and the growth of the community itself, I think there’s a lot to be said about the people of Virginia City and their resiliency,” Tuttle said.
Do Las Vegas’ woes mark a return to equilibrium?
In Las Vegas, which is no stranger to downturns, the hotel and gaming industry is already taking measures.
Different properties are responding in different ways to see what works for them, according to Hill. In many cases, the response reflects a back-to-basics approach that’s reminiscent of old-school Las Vegas.
“Some of the properties have eliminated resort fees and some of them eliminated parking fees,” Hill said. “There are also specials where you’ll get a free meal or have free tickets to a show.”
The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority is also partnering with online travel sites such as Booking.com and Expedia. The partnership includes additional advertising to drive more room nights to Las Vegas.
Hill stressed that it is important to view Las Vegas’ ongoing challenges with a wider lens.
“From a financial standpoint, the city has been setting records for two, two-and-a-half years,” Hill said. “We were doing really exceptionally well.”
Continuing that record growth would be tough, according to analysts such as Aguero and Bonnenfant.
One reason is the environment that led to that growth, which included measures to deal with a rare and historic pandemic. The COVID-19 stimulus gave consumers extra spending money, which drove travel and retail purchases in a big way, Bonnenfant said.
“We’ve hit the post-COVID revenge spending and revenge travel period and all the money and motivation behind doing all that has now dissipated,” Bonnefant said. “So we’re now pulling back.”
Aguero also described Las Vegas’ situation as more of a return to equilibrium.
When looking at visitor volume, the area is back to something “very close” to where it was during the pre-COVID era, according to Aguero.
Although it’s easy to dismiss the online doom and gloom about Las Vegas as just social media influencers farming for clicks, it would be unwise to completely ignore it, Aguero warned.
“I think we’d be fooling ourselves to believe that social media does not have an impact, particularly with younger consumers,” Aguero said.
The good news is that the tourism sector is already making adjustments, Aguero said. But Las Vegas is not immune to national headwinds.
“Las Vegas has a tendency to be a bit of a harbinger,” Aguero said. “As goes the country, so goes Las Vegas — certainly more so than Reno by just orders of magnitude.”
Government policy and consumer confidence continue to raise questions
Higgins is still baffled about how Canada became a target of the Trump administration’s ire. Through the years, no country has been a better ally to the United States than Canada, he said.
Higgins, who has “a lot of very, very close friends in America,” still feels connected to the United States.
“Canadians are rather (ticked) off at some of the comments that Mr. Trump made about Canada being the 51st state and that we’ve been cheating him on the deal for all these years,” Higgins said.
“We feel that we are the No. 1 friend of America.”
Talk of annexing Canada and Greenland are having a negative effect, Hill said, and pointed to government policy as a real concern moving forward.
One example is immigration policy, including detentions of travelers with valid visas and the introduction of higher visa fees.
“Those types of things are harmful and, obviously, Canada is just mad at us,” Hill said. “That seems unnecessary and we’d like to see that go away moving forward.”
Another issue involves high tariffs, which not only affect sentiment from foreign travelers but also hit consumer confidence as U.S. residents pay higher prices for imported goods, Hill said.
Tariffs are a real concern, not just due to consumer sentiment but because of direct effects, said Taylor Adams, president and CEO of the Economic Development Authority of Western Nevada.
Northern Nevada responded to the decline of its casino industry from tribal gaming by diversifying its economy. The adjustment included an increased focus on logistics, manufacturing and technology, which has allowed the Reno area to recover more quickly than Las Vegas from the last few downturns.
“We find ourselves becoming a new destination for tech manufacturing that’s looking to scale, and that diversity that our economy built … is serving us well in the present,” Adams said.
“That said, this is probably why we’re also feeling things like tariffs so much more directly.”
Earlier this year, for example, SA Automotive, a supplier of interior parts for major automakers, announced mass layoffs and shut its Reno facility.
And while Reno-Tahoe tourism isn’t suffering to the same extent that Las Vegas is, concerns remain for the sector moving forward.
The RSCVA is conservatively projecting a nearly 4% dip in taxable room revenue for the 2025-2026 fiscal year.
The decrease is being attributed to a softening in average daily rates for rooms, not necessarily a reduction in visitor traffic. Online travel agents such as Booking.com and Expedia, for example, are seeing shorter booking windows of about 21 days as travelers make reservations closer to their travel dates. This typically signifies higher price sensitivity.
“It can be difficult to predict future performance in any economy,” Larragueta said. “The current environment has led many tourism marketing organizations and destinations to approach the coming year with measured expectations.”
Back in Las Vegas, residents such as Marvin and Roberts are confident the current tourism woes will pass. Las Vegas is no stranger to downturns, after all, and has managed to bounce back stronger every single time, they said.
Marvin has already seen his bartending tips go up to more normal levels starting in September. Roberts also recently took his mom to the Conservatory & Botanical Gardens at Bellagio and there was a fair number of people.
“This big push for higher tariffs, the big push for fixing immigration overnight, all of these big pushes are very new and, in my opinion, they’re unsustainable for the long term,” Roberts said. “I don’t think that this is our new normal.
“I tend to look at everything through a positive lens and I really think that things will blow over.”
