Thursday Fourth of July Filled Las Vegas Rooms to 94.4%

Las Vegas posted 94.4% hotel occupancy over Independence Day 2024, a Thursday holiday the city’s tourism agency had treated as a handicap. The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority later counted 344,000 visitors and $433.5 million in direct spending for that stretch.

Friday and Saturday Fourths since then have not matched it, even after the Strip staged a nine-rooftop fireworks show for America’s 250th birthday.

Thursday Was Supposed to Be the Problem

On June 12, 2024, the LVCVA sold the week as a full calendar of fireworks, pool parties and headliners, while still framing Thursday as an awkward place for a national holiday. Kevin Bagger, the agency’s research director, later said a Thursday Fourth made guests less likely to stretch a trip than a Friday that created a three-day weekend.

The holiday tally went the other way. Rooms that week filled at 94.4%, a rate the destination’s Fourth of July weekends have historically posted in the low-to-mid 90s, and the visitor count of 344,000 became the mark later Fourths failed to beat.

THE 2024 HOLIDAY TALLY

• Weekday: Independence Day fell on Thursday, July 4, 2024.
• Visitors: The LVCVA counted 344,000 people in town for the holiday stretch.
• Occupancy: Hotels filled 94.4% of rooms, with $433.5 million in direct visitor spending.
• The month around it: July still hosted 3,512,500 visitors, only 0.4% below July 2023.

A Thursday start can look like a one-night spike on a spreadsheet. In Las Vegas it also puts Wednesday arrivals into Thursday night fireworks and leaves Friday and Saturday attached to the same trip, which is how a midweek holiday still reads as a long weekend on the Strip.

What Filled Rooms on a Midweek Fourth?

The rooms filled because the week was stacked, not because the calendar suddenly helped. Blink-182 played T-Mobile Arena with Pierce the Veil on July 3, Garth Brooks was in The Colosseum, Lady Gaga was at Dolby Live, and New Edition was at Encore Theater, while dayclubs at Ayu, Drai’s, Encore Beach Club, and TAO Beach and nightclubs at Hakkasan, OMNIA, Zouk, and XS ran electronic bills across the same dates.

On July 6, two days after the holiday, Uruguay beat Brazil on penalties at Allegiant Stadium in a Copa América quarterfinal in front of a quarterfinal crowd of 55,770. That soccer date sat on a Saturday after the Thursday holiday, which kept visitors in paid rooms through the weekend even if they had come for fireworks on the Fourth.

The LVCVA’s own list spread shells across the valley instead of one Strip spectacular, with most resort shows billed near 9 p.m. on July 4.

WHERE THE 2024 SHELLS WENT UP

• Strip and downtown: Caesars Palace around 9 p.m. on July 4; Plaza Hotel & Casino at 9 p.m. that night and 9:15 p.m. on July 5.
• Locals resorts: Durango, Green Valley Ranch, M Resort, and Red Rock, each at 9 p.m. on July 4.
• Water parks: Cowabunga Bay on July 4 and 5 at 8:50 p.m.; Cowabunga Canyon on July 3 and 4 at 8:50 p.m.
• Sports venues: Las Vegas Ballpark after Aviators games on July 2 and 3; Las Vegas Motor Speedway after the Bullring Night of Fire on July 3.

Aces basketball and Aviators baseball sat on the same week as the soccer date, so the sports calendar and the concert calendar were doing the work operators usually assign to a Friday holiday.

Strip Occupancy of 86.5% in July

The holiday packed hotels. The month around it was milder, and the casino floor was worse. LVCVA figures show 3,512,500 visitors in July 2024, with hotel occupancy at 83.7%, down 1.5 points from 85.2% a year earlier, as weekend occupancy rose to 93.2% and midweek occupancy fell to 79.8%.

Strip occupancy for the month was 86.5%. Average daily rate was $160.15, down 1.8% from $163.14, and revenue per available room was $134.05, down 3.6%. Strip ADR was $170.38 and Strip RevPAR was $147.38. Convention attendance slipped 6.9% to 251,600, a drop the LVCVA tied to show rotation, including the absence of the AWFS Fair and its 16,000 attendees.

Harry Reid International Airport still moved 5,060,568 passengers, up 2.3%, the airport’s fourth-highest month on record. The rooms were busy enough. The tables were not.

The Nevada Gaming Control Board’s July 2024 statewide gaming revenue report put Nevada’s win at $1.3 billion, down 6.9%. Strip casinos won $709.3 million, down 15% from $834.9 million a year earlier. Statewide baccarat win collapsed 61.9% to $73.6 million, with hold at 9.69%. Michael Lawton, then the board’s senior economic analyst, said the comparison was against a very strong July 2023, when statewide hold had been 17.62%.

A full Strip and a cold baccarat pit can live in the same month. High-end table win swings on a handful of players, and July 2024’s hold went the wrong way even as weekend rooms sat above 93%.

The Next Two Fourths Drew Fewer People

July 4, 2025, fell on a Friday, the three-day weekend Bagger had contrasted with 2024. The LVCVA had projected 340,000 visitors and 93.1% occupancy for that holiday. The later holiday tally was 310,000 visitors and 85.7% occupancy, 9.9% below 2024’s 344,000.

July 4, 2026, fell on a Saturday. The LVCVA counted 329,000 visitors and 88% occupancy, up from 2025 but still 4.4% below 2024 on visitors and 6.4 points below on occupancy. Historical Fourth weekends, the agency said, have generally sat in the low-to-mid 90% range. About 1,000 extra rooms were on the market versus 2025, which makes a given occupancy rate harder to hold, but it does not rewrite a 344,000-to-329,000 gap.

INDEPENDENCE DAY WEEKEND, THREE WAYS

The 2025 holiday week also showed up in hotel-tracking firm STR’s national numbers as a Las Vegas drag, with a RevPAR drop of 28.7 percent that week, occupancy down 13.4 points and ADR down 14.3%. By late June 2026, a Hotels.com sample of Friday-Saturday stays on July 3 and 4 listed Las Vegas at $143.82 a night, against $202.75 a year earlier.

Amanda Bellarmino, an associate professor at UNLV’s William F. Harrah College of Hospitality, had already described the demand as uneven before the 2025 weekend.

We have been seeing volatility (such as the COVID-19 pandemic, tariffs and consumer uncertainty) for the last several years, and its impact on consumers has been mixed.

Amanda Bellarmino, associate professor, William F. Harrah College of Hospitality at UNLV

July as a whole followed the same arc. Visitor volume fell 12% to 3,089,300 in July 2025, with occupancy at 76.1%. July 2026 recovered to 3,171,600 visitors, up 2.7%, and occupancy of 77.2%, with ADR at $157.45 and RevPAR at $121.55. That is 82,300 visitors regained after a loss of 423,200, about 19.4% of the drop, and the month remained 9.7% below July 2024’s 3,512,500.

Downtown Took July’s Gaming Gain

The 2024 holiday week’s other split was geographic. Downtown occupancy in July 2024 rose 0.8 points to 67.8% while Strip occupancy fell 1.6 points to 86.5%. Downtown casinos won $71.8 million, up 9.9% from $65.4 million, in the same month the Strip dropped 15%.

Locals-facing floors do not live on baccarat hold. They live on slot play from southern Nevada and drive-in holiday traffic, and that mix held up in July 2024 even as Strip table win slid. Clark County as a whole still generated $1.12 billion in gaming revenue that month.

The later Julys flipped some of that script. Strip win rose to $749.1 million in July 2025, up 5.6%, helped by baccarat hold of 17.5% after the 8.8% hold a year earlier, even as visitation fell 12%. J.P. Morgan gaming analyst Daniel Politzer called that month better than expected given the visitor trend. Strip win rose again in July 2026, to $776.3 million, up 3.6%. Downtown occupancy, though, slid to 58.5% in July 2026, down 4.5 points, a reminder that a Strip table recovery does not automatically refill Fremont Street rooms.

Nine Rooftops and a Smaller Holiday Crowd

By July 4, 2026, the product on the skyline was bigger than anything on the 2024 list. Fireworks by Grucci prepared a synchronized show from nine Strip rooftops, MGM Grand, ARIA, Planet Hollywood, Caesars Palace, Treasure Island, The Venetian, Resorts World, Fontainebleau, and The STRAT, billed as the largest Fourth of July fireworks show in Las Vegas history. Gov. Joe Lombardo toured the setup with LVCVA President and CEO Steve Hill and Phil Grucci, CEO of Fireworks by Grucci, and called it the largest Fourth of July fireworks show in the country.

Great to be with Steve Hill, President and CEO of the @LVCVA, and Phil Grucci, CEO of Fireworks by Grucci, for a behind-the-scenes look at the America250 fireworks display preparation.

Las Vegas will proudly host the largest Fourth of July fireworks show in the country, giving… pic.twitter.com/NWaiGNunfA

— Joe Lombardo (@JoeLombardoNV) July 4, 2026

The crowd under those shells was still smaller than the Thursday the destination had worried about. Occupancy of 88% with 329,000 visitors is a better holiday than 2025. It is not 94.4% with 344,000 visitors, and it sat below the low-90s band the LVCVA itself treats as the holiday’s normal range.

Rep. Steven Horsford, whose district includes part of the valley, called Las Vegas the top Fourth of July destination again in 2026 and then pointed at the other side of the ledger, saying lower hotel rates showed visitors and workers were both feeling cost pressure. The public argument around that weekend was about the size of the show. The occupancy file is about how many people paid for a room to watch it.

A Thursday Fourth with Copa América, Blink-182, and a valley full of 9 p.m. shells filled more rooms than a Saturday Fourth with the largest fireworks show the Strip has staged. The weekday was never the leak. The calendar after 2024 was.

Frequently Asked Questions

When Did July 4 Fall in Las Vegas in 2024, 2025, and 2026?

July 4, 2024, was a Thursday, July 4, 2025, was a Friday, and July 4, 2026, was a Saturday. Because 2028 is a leap year, the Independence Day weekday then jumps from Sunday in 2027 to Tuesday in 2028, which puts the next Thursday Fourth on July 4, 2030.

How Much Did a Las Vegas Monorail Pass Cost for the 2024 Holiday?

The Las Vegas Monorail sold discounted 24-hour unlimited-ride passes starting at $13.45 during the 2024 Independence Day period, a figure the LVCVA included in its June 12, 2024, holiday release as a way to move visitors between Strip stops without a car.

How Many Copa América 2024 Matches Did Allegiant Stadium Host?

Three. Ecuador beat Jamaica 3-1 on June 26 in front of 24,074, Brazil beat Paraguay 4-1 on June 28 in front of 46,939, and Uruguay beat Brazil on penalties on July 6 in front of 55,770, a combined 126,783 across the three dates at the Raiders’ stadium.

How Many Visitors Did Las Vegas Host in All of 2024?

The LVCVA’s year-end figures put 2024 visitor volume at 41.7 million, with annual hotel occupancy of 83.6%, an average daily rate of $193.16, and direct visitor spending of $55.1 billion, well above the 344,000-person Independence Day slice that still stands as the recent holiday peak.