Most travelers under a certain age have probably never even stayed in a smoking hotel room.
But despite decades of smoking bans on airplanes, in restaurants, and in public spaces, smoking rooms haven’t disappeared entirely.
There was a time, especially around the 1950s, when smoking was considered cool. Sophisticated. Glamorous. Maybe even sexy. But sometime during the later 20th century, smoking turned a corner. It had been going out of style for years, in large part thanks to the medical industry telling us how smoking and secondhand smoke were bad for us. I remember my aunt (who had been a smoker since the 50s), who lived in Southern California at the time, saying in the early 90s that smokers were like pariahs where she lived.
Wikipedia has a long list of smoking bans in the U.S. that have gone into effect since the very first one was enacted (California, 1995: statewide smoking ban for restaurants).
Smoking Bans in Travel: Planes and Airports
Smoking on U.S. commercial passenger flights was banned in phases, with the final federal restrictions covering domestic and international flights by U.S. carriers.
Of course, they could do that because planes were regulated by the federal government. However, airports are typically owned by local government entities. So it took much longer for airports to eventually say, “You can’t smoke in here anymore.”
Then I got to thinking… people can’t smoke on planes in the U.S. They can’t smoke in most airports in the country, either. What about hotels?
Actually, significantly more hotels in the U.S. still allow on-site smoking. That’s most likely because of two factors:
- Smoking in hotels is regulated by state and local laws, not the federal government
- There are many, many more hotels out there than airports
State Laws on Smoking in Hotels
Before a hotel can allow smoking rooms — remember smoking and non-smoking rooms? — state and local laws have to allow it. According to the American Nonsmokers’ Rights Foundation, as of January 1, 2025, eight states require all hotel and motel rooms to be 100% smokefree:
- California
- Colorado
- Connecticut
- Indiana
- Michigan
- North Dakota
- Vermont
- Wisconsin
However, even if a state has no statewide law requiring all hotel rooms to be smokefree, cities, counties and towns may have their own local laws. As of the same January 1, 2025 update, the American Nonsmokers’ Rights Foundation listed 309 local laws requiring all hotel and motel rooms to be 100% smokefree.
The foundation keeps an ongoing list of those state and local laws in this PDF.
Hotel Brands and Their Smoking Policies
Some major hotel companies and their respective brands don’t allow in-room smoking at all. Others do. Here are their respective policies:
Accor Hotels
“Some Establishments are 100% non-smoking, which means that smoking in the bedrooms is also forbidden.”
Choice Hotels
Choice Hotels appears to leave smoking policies to individual properties and brands, with some brands or locations fully smoke-free. Comfort Suites went smoke-free in 2007, and Comfort Inn followed in 2016.
Hilton
“Many of our properties are now 100% non-smoking hotels, but if available, you may request a smoking room.”
Hyatt
Hyatt has no all-encompassing smoking policy on its corporate website. However, the websites for individual hotels will say what their smoking policies are.
Four Seasons
Four Seasons has no smoking policy on its corporate website. However, the websites for individual hotels will say what their smoking policies are.
IHG
IHG has no all-encompassing smoking policy on its corporate website. However, the websites for individual hotels will say what their smoking policies are.
Marriott
Marriott’s smoke-free policy applies to all of the company’s lodging brands in the United States and Canada. The policy took effect on October 16, 2006, and includes guest rooms, public spaces and associate work areas.
Wyndham
Most Wyndham Hotel brands offer smoking rooms; some don’t. These brands do not offer smoking rooms at all:
- Wingate
- Wyndham Hotels & Resorts
How to Find Smoking Rooms
There’s no federal law for smoking in hotels. There’s also no consistent law from state to state, and sometimes even from hotel to hotel within the same brand. The best way to see if your hotel offers smoking rooms is to check its website or call the hotel.
Years ago, there was a website called smoketels.com that kept smokers up to date on this information, but it appears the site is no longer available. There’s currently a site called smokingfinder.com, although I don’t know how up-to-date it is (the copyright on the page is 2022, and if you search for a hotel via their “partnership with Booking.com,” it autofills the year 2023).
Smoking Trends and the Future of Hotel Rooms
According to the American Lung Association, in 1965, 42.4% of adults said they smoked cigarettes. By 2019, that number was down to 20.8%. The CDC reports in this PDF that as of 2022, 19.8% of American adults smoked tobacco cigarettes (broken down by time of usage, it’s about 11.6% cigarettes, 6% E-cigarettes, 3.7% cigars, 2.1% smokeless tobacco and 0.9% pipes).
With fewer Americans smoking than ever before, it’s probably only a matter of time before smoking rooms become even harder to find.
That doesn’t necessarily mean they’ll disappear completely. As long as there are customers willing to pay for them — and state and local laws allow them — some hotels will likely continue setting aside at least a handful of rooms for smokers.
But compared to just a few decades ago, when smoking and non-smoking rooms were equally common at many hotels, the trend is unmistakable.
Much like smoking sections on airplanes, smoking rooms are gradually becoming a relic of another era of travel. And for many younger travelers, they may eventually become something they’ve only heard about from older generations. 😆
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