Visitation to Las Vegas dropped 6.5% in May, gaming win down

Visitation to Las Vegas fell for the fifth consecutive month in May with occupancy rates, room rates and passenger traffic at Harry Reid International Airport all below levels in May from a year ago,

The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority on Friday reported 3.4 million visitors for the month, down 6.5 percent from a year ago, with room rates off 2.2 percent thanks to a big drop in downtown Las Vegas rates, and occupancy levels falling 3.1 percentage points to 83 percent.

Gaming win also was down 2.5 percent for the month in Clark County and, as the Clark County Department of Aviation reported Thursday, passenger traffic at Harry Reid International Airport fell 3.9 percent for the month.

The one bright spot among tourism indicators was an uptick in convention visitation by 10.7 percent to 511,200 – which still was the lowest monthly total of 2025.

“With headwinds of ongoing economic uncertainty, the destination hosted approximately 3.4 million visitors in May, down 6.5 percent year over year,” said Kevin Bagger, the director of LVCVA research.

Bagger said convention attendance was boosted by positive show rotations, with a Bitcoin conference (30,000 attendees), LightFair International (8,500 attendees) and the National Automatic Merchandising Association-NAMA Show (5,000 attendees) boosting the numbers.

There also were some shows that occurred in May that were shifted from other months. The Antique Jewelry & Watch Show (7,500 attendees) occurred in June last year, and Petzone360 Live (5,000 attendees) was in April last year.

Room rates, while down from a year ago, were still the highest monthly level recorded in 2025 at $198.20 a night. Room rates fell substantially in downtown Las Vegas, with rates off 12.4 percent to $109.39 a night. Strip rates fell 1.2 percent to $181.23 a night.

Most of the other tourism indicators fell in May, including room nights occupied, passenger counts at Reid International and vehicle traffic on major highways leading into Las Vegas monitored by the Nevada Department of Transportation. Traffic on Interstate 15 at the California-Nevada border fell 5 percent to 45,215 a day.

The Clark County Department of Aviation on Thursday reported a 3.9 percent decline in passenger traffic, including an 8.7 percent drop in international arrivals and departures, much of it attributed to declines in passengers from Canada.

Laughlin gains

What was Las Vegas’ loss appeared to be Laughlin’s gain.

The Colorado River gambling destination posted visitor volume of 129,000, up 11.2 percent from a year ago, with gross gaming revenue up 17 percent to $43.2 million there and passenger traffic at Bullhead City-Laughlin International Airport up 27.8 percent to 12,331 passengers.

Gaming numbers also showed May downturns from last year.

The decline in gaming win in the state, on the Strip and in downtown Las Vegas widened in May as eight of the 20 markets monitored by the state won less money in the month than they did a year ago.

The Nevada Gaming Control Board on Friday said the state’s major casinos won $1.29 billion from players for the month, a 2.2 percent drop from May 2024.

Downtown Las Vegas win was off 11.4 percent to $66.4 million and the Strip was down 3.9 percent to $713.8 million for the month. Clark County revenue fell 2.5 percent to $1.12 billion.

The only state markets to capitalize with double-digit percentage increases in May were Laughlin and Sparks, up 11.8 percent to $17.2 million.

The biggest decline was registered in South Lake Tahoe, down 23.4 percent to $13.5 million.

Shelley Newell, senior economic analyst for the Control Board, said Nevada continued to record gaming win amounts in excess of pre-pandemic levels for the month. May represented the 51st straight month of the state recording at least $1 billion in monthly gaming win.

Unless there’s a remarkable turnaround in June, Nevada’s streak of consecutive years of record gaming revenue growth will end at three. The Control Board is expected to release June numbers in late July.

Percentage-fee taxes collected by the state is running flat and will fall just short of $1 billion for the state general fund. The board reported collecting $79.2 million as of Tuesday for a total of $990.4 million for the fiscal year that ends Monday. Collections for the 2025 fiscal year are down 0.7 percent from a year ago.

Contact Richard N. Velotta at rvelotta@reviewjournal.com or 702-477-3893. Follow @RickVelotta on X.