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Solar eclipse pushes Europe hotel rates past $1,000 a night
Reykjavik hotel prices averaged $1,012 a night during eclipse week. Short-term rentals in Bilbao surged 206% to $1,088. Discounting emerged closer to the event.
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Hotel and short-term rental prices in parts of Europe hit over $1,000 a night as the Aug. 12 solar eclipse drove a surge in travel demand.
The eclipse, visible across the U.K., Iceland, northern Spain, Greenland and Portugal, has hospitality businesses testing how high they can push rates. Data from commercial travel firm Lighthouse Intelligence, checked in mid-July about four weeks out, showed Reykjavik hotel prices averaging $1,012 a night during eclipse week – double the same period in 2025. Short-term rentals in the city averaged $1,172, up 178% from a year earlier.
In Bilbao, short-term rentals hit $1,088 per night, a 206% jump. Hotel rooms there ran $315, up 35%. Santiago de Compostela, just outside the path of totality, was the cheapest at $193 for hotels, up 13%, per Lighthouse.
"Testing what the market can bear when it comes to pricing is a common practice by hoteliers in the face of 'once in a lifetime' demand events, like FIFA World Cups or Taylor Swift concerts," Jonathan Gough, content marketing team lead at Lighthouse, told CNBC.
The latest data shared with CNBC showed discounting closer to the event. The lowest available hotel rates for Aug. 12 in Reykjavik and Iceland's wider capital region had fallen 46% and 51%, respectively, from mid-May, to $805 and $793 when checked on Aug. 10.
Gough said different hoteliers chose different pricing strategies. "Iceland priced the eclipse speculatively to begin with. Rooms were listed at three to four times normal levels more than a year out, and hotels have spent the past three months walking that back."