Hospitality Foresight: The Forces Shaping 2026 and Beyond

Hospitality isn’t heading for a single moment of disruption. It’s moving through a structural

reset. By 2026 and beyond, the brands that win won’t be the loudest or the most novel, but

the most intentional, designed for new patterns of appetite, attention and control.

These are not predictions built on hype. They are signals already visible in guest behaviour,

operating models and platform power. The question for operators is no longer what’s

changing, but how quickly they adapt.

1. The appetite reset

GLP-1s and wellness-led living no longer sit at the margins. They will structurally rewire

appetite. Smaller portions, fewer calories and more deliberate choices become the default,

not the exception.

This is not a diet trend, it is a behavioural reset. The opportunity is to make less feel

premium. Portion architecture, satiety-driven language and functional signals like protein,

fibre and lower sugar allow guests to eat less without feeling deprived.

Commercially, this becomes a margin strategy. As volume softens, guests on appetite-

suppressing or wellness-led journeys increasingly trade down in portion size while trading up

in perceived quality. Less food, done better, protects margin while aligning with emerging

behaviour.

2. The return of human led service

As ordering, planning and logistics continue to automate, the value of human service will

rise, not fall. In 2026, technology will be expected to remove friction entirely. What guests will remember is what machines can’t do.

Warmth. Intuition. Care delivered in the moment.

The next era of service is not about efficiency theatre, but emotional intelligence. Let

technology eliminate friction so teams can focus on welcome, guidance, pacing and

recovery. Guests rarely remember what they ordered, but they vividly remember how they

were made to feel when something went wrong.

In an automated world, human judgement becomes the luxury signal.

3. Fast or fantastic

Looking ahead, hospitality polarises. Guests increasingly demand extremes: frictionless

speed or an experience worth leaving home for.

What erodes fastest is the “pretty good, sort of nice” offer that’s neither fast nor memorable.

By 2026, guests will routinely trade convenience for speed or convenience for meaning, but

rarely pay for both unless the experience is clearly tiered and pre-sold.

Experience will no longer be a vague promise. It will be engineered through immersion,

story, design, sound and performance, packaged into clear tiers tied to occasion. Brands that continue to tweak the middle won’t stand still, they’ll slowly lose relevance.

4. The silent revenue grab

The next phase of platform consolidation is not coming, it’s already underway. We are

entering an era when platforms and reservation systems will function less like utilities and

more like toll roads.

Through mergers, acquisitions and closed ecosystems, control of discovery, booking,

payment and customer data is being centralised. The commercial impact is subtle but

compounding. Operators increasingly pay repeatedly for access to the same guest: first for

discovery, then for booking, then again for retention.

The real risk isn’t dependency, it’s cumulative margin erosion and the slow transfer of

ownership of the guest relationship, in-venue and at home, echoing the hotel industry’s

experience with OTAs in the 2010s, a battle many hotel groups are still fighting to regain

control from today.

5. Health without the halo

During 2026, “better for you” as a moral proposition will be obsolete.

The more health is preached, the less effective it becomes. The future lies in engineering

function quietly into familiar food. Blended proteins, fungi and functional ingredients will

deliver taste, satiety and value without asking guests to change identity or behaviour.

Health that whispers will outperform health that lectures. Adoption will come through

familiarity, not ideology.

6. Radical menu simplicity

Volatility isn’t a temporary phase. Over the coming years, supply disruption and cost

pressure will remain structural realities. The response won’t be more optionality, but less.

Shorter menus will continue to outperform, not because they restrict choice, but because

they feel intentional. Designed for flexibility and built on ruthless cross-utilisation, simple

menus stabilise buying, reduce waste and protect execution when supply breaks.

This isn’t cost cutting. It’s operational leadership in an uncertain environment.

7. Sustainability without sermon

The sustainability conversation is maturing beyond storytelling. It will only add value when it

improves the product itself.

Guests won’t pay more for slogans. They will pay for flavour, provenance and resilience they

can taste. Regenerative farming, transparent sourcing and real farmer partnerships become

premium signals, forcing menus to be designed around credible, resilient ingredients.

Sustainability that doesn’t show up on the plate won’t survive scrutiny.

8. Code in the kitchen

Through 2026 and beyond, AI and digitisation will underpin nearly every layer of hospitality:

reviews, menus, labour, forecasting, pricing and loyalty.

The most effective systems will be invisible to guests but transformational for teams. Their

role is not spectacle, but relief. Reducing operational load so people can focus on presence,

judgement and care.

The advantage will belong to operators who use code to eliminate friction, hardwire

consistency and give teams back the time to actually host.

The final word

Across all these trends, one signal is clear. The future of hospitality is not about more choice,

more tech or more noise. It’s about clarity.

Clarity of offer. Clarity of experience. Clarity of who owns the guest relationship. Clear

decisions about whether you are fast or fantastic, automated or human, rented or owned.

The brands that succeed beyond 2026 won’t chase trends. They’ll design for less, execute

with intent, focus on value and protect the human moments machines can’t replace.