With the United Kingdom's fast vaccine rollout and the government allowing hotels to fully reopen on May 17, the country's hotel industry is in the best shape it has been for a while, despite recent unsettled weather.

U.K. officials have said the country is on the right side of the COVID-19 pandemic and plan to lift all remaining restrictions on June 21.

Occupancy is moving in the right direction, said Thomas Emanuel, director at STR, CoStar’s hospitality analytics firm. The premium in the long-standing pattern of weekday spikes and weekend troughs should soon evaporate as leisure demand picks up.

Until May 17, overnight stays at hotels were only permitted for essential purposes, Emanuel said.

The change in revenue per available room for the month up to May 16 — the day before U.K. hotels reopened — correlates with changes in occupancy, but “remains only slightly above 20% of 2019 levels.”

Occupancy in April was subdued, especially in the U.K.'s four country capitals: Belfast, Edinburgh, London and Cardiff, which posted occupancies of 16%, 24%, 29% and 31%, respectively. Occupancy for the entire U.K. for the month was 35%.

Data for the week ending May 16 showed improvements, and Emanuel said there's hope this will continue the upward trend seen following the reopening announcement. For those seven days, Belfast, Edinburgh, London and Cardiff achieved occupancy of 23%, 33%, 29% and 38%, respectively, which highlight London’s march toward recovery is still slow. For the same week, Inverness, gateway to the Scottish Highlands, posted occupancy of 60%.

Scotland reopened its hotels on April 26, several weeks earlier than the rest of the U.K., Emanuel said. Edinburgh, Scotland's capital, achieved 45% occupancy on its first Saturday of reopening.

Forward bookings have increased as travelers feel more confident with their travel decisions and coronavirus transmissions staying in line or below what is required for any next government restriction to be put into place.

Consumers are even booking stays one to two months out, which Emanuel said was “suggesting the return of the leisure traveler.”

Occupancy on the books is almost entirely transient for the short term and is likely leisure-based demand, he said. However, moving into the third and fourth quarters, group bookings start to rise, reflecting confidence from businesses and event planners in a COVID-19-safe future.

“Once we have some certainty, bookings will follow,” he said, adding that the next month’s data will reflect the first full month of reopened accommodations.

For more of Emanuel’s insights into U.K. performance data, please watch the video above.

Editor’s note: The video included in this article was filmed by Thomas Emanuel, director at STR, on May 24, 2021, and edited and produced by CoStar Group. HNN is a division of STR, a CoStar Group company.