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Chattanooga hotel visits, tourism spending highest in Tennessee last year

Photo by Dave Flessner / Construction continues on a 184-room Embassy Suites hotel being built by Vision Hospitality at Broad and Fourth Streets in downtown Chattanooga. The $54 million hotel is scheduled to open later this year as hotel developers add about 1,100 more hotel rooms in the Chattanooga market this year and next. Photo taken March 18, 2025.
Photo by Dave Flessner / Construction continues on a 184-room Embassy Suites hotel being built by Vision Hospitality at Broad and Fourth Streets in downtown Chattanooga. The $54 million hotel is scheduled to open later this year as hotel developers add about 1,100 more hotel rooms in the Chattanooga market this year and next. Photo taken March 18, 2025. Photo by Dave Flessner / Construction continues on a 184-room Embassy Suites hotel being built by Vision Hospitality at Broad and Fourth Streets in downtown Chattanooga. The $54 million hotel is scheduled to open later this year as hotel developers add about 1,100 more hotel rooms in the Chattanooga market this year and next. Photo taken March 18, 2025.

By Dave Flessner 4 min read

Hamilton County outpaced Tennessee’s other major tourism destinations in drawing more overnight visitors to the Scenic City during 2024.

But with 1,100 more hotel rooms coming on the Chattanooga market, filling up local hotels will be a challenge in 2025, according to Chattanooga Tourism Co. President Barry White.

“More people are visiting Chattanooga and Hamilton County and that is driving new hotel development,” White told the Hamilton County in the tourism agency’s annual report. “Now the challenge becomes to attract more people to fill those rooms. Hamilton County is currently experiencing one of the most significant periods of hotel growth in recent history.”

In the next year, more hotel rooms are being added to the downtown market, from a new $54 million Embassy Suites hotel taking shape at Fourth and Broad, a $40 million Waymark by Hilton being built at the old Chattanooga Bank Building and a new $30 million Caption by Hyatt being built on West Main Street. A new $30 million AC Hotel by Marriott is proposed at Broad and Main Streets and a eight-story Drury Plaza hotel is planned on the site the former downtown Sports Barn.

Tennessee continues to expand its hotel offerings despite a slowdown nationwide. A study by the commercial real estate data company CoStar recently reported that Nashville ranked No. 2 behind only New York City in the number of new hotel rooms being added in 2025. The Music City is adding 2,849 more hotel rooms this year.