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Forbes Travel Guide has released its 2026 Star Awards, unveiling an expanded roster of Five-Star, Four-Star and Recommended hotels that reflects both the rapid globalization of luxury travel and shifting guest expectations around service, wellness and sense of place.
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A Wider Global Footprint for the 68th Star Awards
The 2026 edition of Forbes Travel Guide’s Star Awards, the 68th in the program’s history, is described in published coverage as the most expansive yet, with rated properties now spanning more than 100 countries. Recent reports highlight that new destinations such as Bhutan, Croatia, Poland, Tanzania and Uzbekistan appear on the list for the first time, underscoring how high-end hotel development has pushed beyond long-established luxury capitals.
Forbes Travel Guide maintains that its inspectors continue to travel anonymously and pay their own way, with service performance outweighing hardware in the scoring. Publicly available information indicates that roughly 70 percent of a property’s rating is tied to service, while 30 percent focuses on facilities, a weighting that favors hotels investing in staff training and personalized touches over headline-grabbing design alone.
Industry reaction suggests that this year’s broader geographic spread also reflects post-pandemic network strategies, as brands open in secondary cities and emerging leisure markets to capture new demand. For travelers, the 2026 list effectively functions as a map of where luxury flagships are clustering next, from coastal retreats in East Africa to restored heritage properties in Central and Eastern Europe.
Hotel Brands Jostle for Five-Star Dominance
Among individual hotel companies, several global groups are using the 2026 Star Awards to underline their positioning at the top of the luxury segment. Coverage of the results notes that Marriott International’s Luxury Group accounts for a sizeable share of new Five-Star hotels this year, adding to a portfolio that already includes long-established flagships in major gateway cities.
Press statements from individual properties illustrate how competitive the Five-Star field has become. Wynn Resorts, for example, reports that it has secured 18 Five-Star awards across its resorts, describing the collection as the longest-running group of Forbes Travel Guide Five-Star properties operated by an independent hotel company. Other brands, from regional players in Asia to coastal resorts in North America, are similarly highlighting repeat Five-Star wins as a signal of consistency to high-spend guests.
The Star Awards are also driving internal benchmarks. Announcements from hotels in markets such as Cape Cod, Arizona and Hawaii indicate that retaining a Five-Star rating for consecutive years has become a central performance goal, influencing everything from capital-investment planning to service culture programs on the ground.
New Milestones at Sea and in Resort Luxury
While the list is still dominated by land-based hotels and resorts, the 2026 awards mark a turning point for luxury at sea. Forbes Travel Guide’s own coverage identifies The Ritz-Carlton Yacht Collection’s Ilma as the world’s first Five-Star cruise, signaling that ocean-going hardware can now compete directly with top urban hotels and island resorts in the eyes of inspectors.
In parallel, Celebrity Cruises’ new ship Celebrity Xcel has seen its restaurant Le Voyage recognized as the first Five-Star cruise restaurant, an accolade that observers say narrows the experiential gap between leading cruise dining rooms and marquee land-based fine-dining venues. Together, these milestones suggest that the Star Awards are increasingly mode-agnostic, focusing on service and experience whether a guest checks into a city tower, a beach villa or a yacht suite.
On shore, the 2026 list continues to reward properties that blend resort settings with high-touch hospitality. Communication from resorts in destinations such as Anguilla, coastal New England and the American Southwest emphasizes features like extensive wellness facilities, curated nature programs and locally driven culinary concepts, indicating how the Five-Star label has evolved beyond traditional white-glove formality.
Asia-Pacific and Emerging Markets Strengthen Their Presence
The 2026 Star Awards also underline the rising influence of Asia-Pacific and emerging markets within luxury hospitality. Releases from hotel groups in Vietnam, China and Japan show multiple properties maintaining or earning Five-Star and Four-Star status, reinforcing a regional shift that has been building for more than a decade.
Capella properties in cities such as Hanoi and Shanghai, for instance, report Five-Star recognition for 2026, while Japanese brands publicize new Four-Star designations in Tokyo and Kyoto. Analysts note that these wins often coincide with extensive refurbishments and the introduction of destination-focused programming, including cultural immersion experiences and chef-led restaurant concepts.
Beyond Asia, new entrants from Eastern Europe, Central Asia and parts of Africa are appearing on the Star Awards list for the first time. Public information indicates that this expansion reflects both greater on-the-ground investment in luxury infrastructure and Forbes Travel Guide’s efforts to position itself as a fully global standard-setter rather than a primarily North American and Western European benchmark.
What the 2026 List Signals for Future Luxury Travel
For frequent travelers and industry planners, the 2026 Hotel Star Awards act as a barometer for where high-end demand is flowing next. The prominence of wellness-led resorts, the formal recognition of ultra-luxury cruise products and the diversification into new countries all point to a market where experience, authenticity and flexibility are increasingly intertwined.
Market commentators note that properties on the list are leaning into deeper guest engagement, from multi-day cultural itineraries to personalized wellness journeys that continue beyond check-out through digital follow-up. At the same time, the weighting that Forbes Travel Guide places on service suggests that staffing strategies and training programs will remain critical differentiators as brands compete for future recognition.
As additional openings come online ahead of major global events in 2026 and beyond, observers expect the Star Awards to continue evolving, potentially bringing even more hybrid hospitality concepts into the fold. For now, the 2026 list underscores that the definition of a Five-Star hotel experience is broader and more mobile than ever, stretching from restored palaces and city icons to secluded nature retreats and high-design ships at sea.