Some Singapore hotel rooms listed at seven times usual rates before Grand Prix
CNA found steep prices for some rooms ahead of the Oct. 9–11 race, while Trip.com reported stronger bookings and the city prepared for more than 40 business events.
Singapore hotel rooms were listed at more than seven times their usual rates in some checks reported by CNA on Oct. 8, 2026, ahead of the Oct. 9–11 Formula 1 Grand Prix. The race coincides with more than 40 business events, adding another source of demand for rooms in the city.
The sevenfold figure describes some listings checked by CNA, rather than an average for Singapore hotels. The available report does not identify the properties, room types, comparison dates or prices behind those checks. Travellers considering a stay around the race therefore cannot treat that figure as a measure of every room on offer.
What the booking figures show
Trip.com told CNA that reservations in Singapore for Friday through Sunday, Oct. 9–11, were more than 80% higher than for the same period a year earlier. That is a comparison from one booking platform. It does not give a total number of reservations, cover every way guests book hotels or establish how many stays will be completed.
The platform also said some Formula 1 fans were extending their trips because of back-to-back race weekends in the region. CNA reported that Malaysia’s Sepang International Circuit hosted the Bahrain Grand Prix on Oct. 2–4, the weekend before the scheduled Singapore race. The report does not quantify how much those extended trips contribute to Singapore’s hotel bookings.
For visitors, the timing matters: the reported price checks and reservation comparison concern a specific race weekend, when leisure travel overlaps with business gatherings. Neither figure establishes the price a traveller will ultimately pay for a particular room. The available material also does not say how many rooms remain available for those dates.
More business events around the Singapore Grand Prix
CNA reported Singapore Tourism Board figures showing more than 40 meetings, incentives, conferences and exhibitions clustered around this year’s Formula 1 period. The comparable count was about 25 to 30 in each of the previous two years. Those counts establish a busier events calendar, although they do not measure how many hotel nights attendees will book.
The events named in CNA’s report include TOKEN2049, the Global-Asia Family Office Summit and the Milken Institute Asia Summit. Their scheduling puts business visitors in Singapore around the race period. The available figures do not separate hotel demand from conference attendees and race visitors, so the contribution of each group remains unclear.
How previous Grand Prix periods compare
Singapore has seen strong hotel performance during a previous Grand Prix period. CoStar/STR’s preliminary October 2025 data put average daily room rate at S$384.15, up 19.5% from a year earlier, and revenue per available room at S$317.96, up 27.3%. Monthly occupancy was 82.8%, an increase of 6.5%. Those are figures for October 2025, not forecasts for this year’s race.
CoStar/STR recorded a sharper peak on Oct. 3, 2025: occupancy reached 95.9%, average daily rate S$757.62 and revenue per available room S$726.47. The one-day figures show how different a race-period peak can be from a monthly average. They cannot establish whether the 2026 weekend will reach similar levels.
The Singapore Tourism Board’s February 2026 report gives a broader comparison for 2025. It put full-year hotel occupancy at 81.9%, against 81.4% in 2024. Average room rate was S$273.56, down 1%, while revenue per available room was S$224.04, down 0.4%. Those annual figures describe a different period and cannot be used as the usual price for each room in CNA’s checks.
The Tourism Board also reported 16.9 million international visitor arrivals in 2025, 2.3% more than in 2024. It counted 300,641 attendees across the three-day 2025 Grand Prix, up 11.7% from 2024. Attendance and visitor totals provide context for Singapore’s tourism market; they do not establish this year’s eventual hotel occupancy or spending.
What remains unknown about 2026 hotel rates
The race weekend had not begun when CNA published its Oct. 8 report. The reported listings and Trip.com reservations are current signals of demand, while CoStar/STR’s figures describe a past event and the Tourism Board’s hotel figures cover 2025. None is a final measure of rates paid or rooms occupied during the 2026 Grand Prix.
It is also unclear from the available reporting whether sevenfold price comparisons occur across the wider market or only among the rooms CNA checked. The combined effect of the race and the larger business-events calendar on hotel performance will remain uncertain until completed-stay and market-wide figures are available.
Sources and context
- Singapore hotel rates soar as F1, MICE events drive tourism demandCNA
- Record Singapore tourism receipts from January to September 2025Singapore Tourism Board
- Grand Prix drove Singapore hotel rates to record-highsCoStar / STR
AI-assisted article checked against the listed sources. NewsJaws did not conduct interviews or attend the reported events.
About NewsJaws Desk
AI-assisted reporting and explainers reviewed against the linked source documents. No claim of on-scene reporting or original interviews.