Over the past decade, technology in hospitality has shifted from being useful to being essential. But the last two years? That’s where the real disruption has begun. Artificial intelligence – once a buzzword floating somewhere between sci-fi and vague digital strategy decks – is now directly influencing how trips are discovered, how teams work, and how guests experience a stay from start to finish.
Jo Lynch (Account Director at KAM) recently attended the UK Hospitality Tech and AI event and noted how it was fascinating to hear from industry and AI experts about what’s really happening at the intersection of AI and hospitality—from robotic room service to agentic AI systems, from back-office automation to the redefinition of digital discovery—and why the coming years will reshape the sector more profoundly than anything we’ve seen since online booking.
Across the industry, leaders are feeling the momentum – and the pressure. According to recent discussions at industry panels, only 2% of hospitality leaders feel ahead of the market in AI adoption, while more than 75% feel they’re behind. Yet, at the same time, nearly 36% plan to increase AI investment, even in a tough financial climate.
Why? Because AI is no longer an abstract future. It’s here and it’s useful. And it’s rapidly becoming a competitive differentiator
From tools to teammates: How AI is changing work inside hospitality businesses
One of the clearest themes emerging across hotels, restaurants, and tourism organisations is this: AI isn’t arriving as a replacement for staff. It’s arriving as a supporting colleague.
Hotels like Maldron Newcastle are already proving the point. Their adoption of room-service robots wasn’t about removing people—it was about giving teams breathing room. Robots handle routine deliveries, freeing staff to focus on high-value guest interaction. And crucially, guests love it. Kids delight in the experience; older guests find it fun rather than intimidating. The result? Room-service revenue doubled within 12 months.
That blend of operational efficiency and guest delight is the sweet spot.
But AI is also making less visible roles easier. Businesses are cutting hours of drudgery through:
- automated meeting note-takers
- AI-powered policy search tools
- payroll forecasting supported by AI
- automated data entry between systems
Some companies are even looking toward the next step: humanoid robots in back-of-house roles. As one operator put it, if a robot can safely prep vegetables for £20,000, that suddenly becomes a commercially sound investment—especially if it frees budget to bring back lost roles like concierge teams.
Across the board, though, the sentiment is clear. AI isn’t here to flatten hospitality. It’s here to give teams the space to be more human.
The rise of agentic AI: Systems that don’t just process tasks – they perform them
The first wave of AI tools in the sector helped with content: writing emails, summarising reviews, analysing data. The next wave is dynamic. It’s agentic—AI that can perform multi-step tasks by itself.
Imagine a system that can:
- read your policies,
- understand your workflows,
- move data between systems,
- check availability,
- send guest confirmations,
- and raise flags for staff only when needed.
These platforms are already being used in hospitality operations. They connect legacy systems, eliminate duplicate data entry, and streamline back-office processes that typically burn hours of staff time.
This matters enormously because one of hospitality’s biggest operational headaches is exactly this: systems that don’t talk to each other. Businesses are drowning in disconnected platforms, workarounds, manual exporting, re-typing, forwarding and fixing.
There is no “plug-and-play” answer yet. But agentic AI is getting close.
Before any business jumps in, though, experts insist on one step: an audit. Understand every system, every workflow, every dependency first. Only then can AI genuinely layer over the top – and genuinely transform the way the business runs.
AI is re-writing the guest journey – from discovery to booking to stay
One of the most dramatic shifts in the past two years has been how travellers discover and select experiences.
1. AI search is replacing traditional search
AI-generated results are now the first stop for many travellers. This trend has cut a billion views from Wikipedia, with similar impacts hitting travel blogs and local guides.
To stay visible, hospitality businesses now have to optimise not for Google—but for AI models.
That means:
- structured FAQs
- up-to-date content everywhere
- clear, machine-readable information
If your content isn’t AI-friendly, you become invisible in the next era of digital discovery.
2. AI itinerary planners are becoming mainstream
Tools like Mindtrip and Guide Geek allow people to plan entire trips collaboratively. They integrate maps, timetables, local guides, social content, and booking options—sometimes all inside a messaging app.
But this comes with a catch: real-time data failures ruin the experience. Whether it’s ferry schedules, weather updates, or last-minute changes, AI itineraries need accurate feeds, or customers simply abandon them.
3. Direct booking is being disrupted – again
Online Travel Agents aren’t sitting still. Booking.com, Expedia, and Google are all racing to integrate AI:
- AI itinerary assistants
- summarised reviews
- smarter filters
- conversational booking inside ChatGPT
But Property Management Systems, hotels, and independent venues are also exploring direct integrations with AI tools, letting guests check availability, book rooms, and modify reservations from inside ChatGPT itself.
In other words, the middle layer—the interface where booking happens—is up for grabs. And whoever wins that layer wins the customer
Consumer expectations are outpacing industry readinesss
Consumers have already moved faster than hospitality businesses in adopting AI.
A few striking trends:
- 25% of consumers now use AI (like ChatGPT) to discover places to go—half as many as use Google.
- 88% expect a response from a hospitality business within a day; 19% expect it instantly.
- 73%+ of those under 34 believe businesses that don’t adopt AI will fall behind.
- Digital payments have surged from 6% to 43% in the past decade.
- More than half of consumers want a mix of technology and human interaction—not one or the other.
This puts pressure on hospitality leaders to adopt AI without losing the human touch. And this is where the trust issue emerges
The growing challenges of trust and authenticity in an AI-driven world
AI makes content easy to generate—and easy to fake. That’s created a wave of:
- fake reviews
- AI-generated guidebooks
- entirely fabricated restaurants or hotels
- misleading or invalid travel advice
Guests are confused about what to believe. Businesses are struggling to maintain credibility.
Still, the sector must strike a balance. AI can summarise, recommend, and assist. But luxury and high-touch hospitality rely on authenticity – an area where human interaction isn’t optional.
The skills revolution: hospitality’s next workforce must be AI-native AND human-centric
Colleges and training providers are now teaching technical skills—robotics, AI tools, digital systems—but educators are increasingly aware of what’s been lost: interpersonal skills.
The next generation entering hospitality may be more technically capable than ever, but hospitality is still a human industry. Their ability to interact, empathise, and create memorable moments will matter just as much as their ability to run an AI-powered PMS.
Inside organisations, the future belongs to cross-departmental “AI champions”—people embedded in every team, not just IT. Marketing, finance, HR, operations—every department is becoming a tech department.
So what comes next?
Hospitality is in a liminal space—not yet transformed, but no longer pre-AI either.
The path forward includes:
- Operational AI that quietly removes friction
- Guest-facing robotics that add delight, not distance
- Agentic AI systems that unify fragmented back-office tools
- Trusted review ecosystems to combat AI-generated misinformation
- AI-optimised content to stay discoverable in a world of AI search
- New workforce models combining technical fluency with human warmth
And perhaps most importantly: leaders who are curious, realistic, and strategic rather than reactive.
The businesses that win won’t be the ones that adopt AI the fastest. They’ll be the ones that adopt AI the smartest—as a tool that frees humans to deliver the hospitality experiences that technology can’t replicate.
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