How Aparthotels Are Changing the Way Business Travellers Book Short Stays

The standard hotel room has been the default for work trips for decades. But a growing number of business travellers are choosing something different. Aparthotels, a format that blends hotel services with apartment-style space, have been gaining ground across UK cities.

As recently as 2019, the sector accounted for around 3% of total UK hospitality accommodation, and with thousands of new units delivered since then, that share keeps climbing. Most of it comes down to cost and convenience, driven by the people and companies actually paying for business travel.

What an Aparthotel Actually Looks Like

An aparthotel is somewhere between a hotel room and a serviced apartment. At the smaller end, you’re looking at a studio layout with a bed, a kitchenette, and a desk or table in one open-plan space. Larger units might have a separate living area or bedroom, but many properties operate closer to the studio format.

What sets them apart from a standard hotel is the kitchen access and the sense of a functional living space, even in a compact room. You’ll still often get hotel-level services like a staffed reception, housekeeping, and often a gym or communal workspace. So you’re not giving up the managed side of things, you’re just getting a room that works more like a place you’d actually live in.

Why Corporate Travel Is Driving the Trend

For a one-night stay, a hotel room does the job. But business trips increasingly run to three, four, or five nights, and that’s where the aparthotel format starts to make more sense. Having a kitchenette means you’re not eating out for every meal. Having a desk that isn’t wedged into a corner of a bedroom means you can actually get work done in the evening.

Companies are noticing too. For organisations managing teams who travel regularly, aparthotels often come in at a lower nightly rate than equivalent hotels, especially in city centres. The cost argument alone is enough to shift booking patterns, but it’s also just a better experience for the person travelling. A functional space for a midweek stay beats a hotel room with a trouser press and a minibar.

How Business Travellers Find the Right Property

One of the challenges with aparthotels is that they don’t always show up where you’d expect. Many properties sit outside the main hotel booking platforms, and quality varies. For corporate bookers, that’s a real problem when you need to place someone in a specific city at short notice.

Today, some business travel specialists focus specifically on sourcing high-quality aparthotel and serviced apartment options worldwide. For businesses, that means access to properties that have been checked against consistent standards, with clear information on what’s actually included. It removes the guesswork that comes with booking through general platforms.

Where the UK Market Is Heading

In more established markets like the US, the extended-stay and serviced apartment format already holds a significantly larger share of overall accommodation than it does in the UK. Analysts expect that gap to narrow as the UK development pipeline grows and more travellers experience the format for themselves.

The reasons are the same ones driving growth here: you get more space, you’re not locked into hotel pricing for every meal, and for anything longer than a couple of nights, the numbers usually work out better. The UK market has a lot of catching up to do, and the pipeline suggests it will.

What This Could Mean for the Isle of Wight

The Island isn’t an obvious corporate travel destination, but the numbers from early 2025 are worth a look. Figures covering the first half of 2025 show that visitor stays of one to three nights rose by 9.1%, even as overall visitor numbers fell by around 5%. More people are coming for shorter breaks, and that pattern lines up with the kind of business and bleisure travel that’s growing nationally.

The Isle of Wight has traditionally leaned on self-catering lets and B&Bs, and there’s no aparthotel pipeline here yet. But as remote and hybrid working patterns push business travel into less conventional destinations, the demand for flexible, professionally managed short-stay accommodation could follow. It’s a trend worth watching locally, even if formal aparthotel development is still some way off.

A Quiet Shift With Room to Grow

Aparthotels haven’t replaced hotels and they’re not going to. But for business travellers doing three-to-five night stays, they’re often the better option, and more companies are booking accordingly. That 3% market share figure has plenty of room to climb.