If you assume that a five-star stay in Delhi comes to “about a thousand per night”, the week of the India-AI Impact Summit 2026 is dismantling that intuition in real time.

On Tuesday morning, a quick scan of bookings on Delhi hotel websites showed numbers that typically belong to once-a-year calendar times, unless it was New Year’s Eve or a big wedding weekend.

A night at a five-star hotel in the capital crossed Rs 10 lakh, and the jump was driven by a very specific rush: the city is gearing up to host the India-AI Impact Summit 2026 at Bharat Mandapam from February 16 to 20, an event expected to bring foreign delegates, policy makers, technology leaders and speakers to Delhi.

This increase is now visible not only on online travel portals, but also in direct prices on hotel websites, where the gap between a “normal” late February night and a peak week night looks less like an incremental excursion and more like a hard reset.

What the numbers show: A week apart, the prices don’t even look related

To understand the scale, here’s a simple comparison of February 18-19 (the week of the summit) with February 25-26 (a week later). The pattern is consistent across brands: the closer the stay is to the peak dates, the more aggressively the inventory is priced, especially in suites.

1) Taj Palace, Delhi (direct price from website)

• Deluxe Twin Room with Diplomatic Enclave View: Rs 30,000 (February 25-26) vs Rs 60,500 (February 18-19)

• Presidential 2 Bed Suite with Garden Pool View: Rs 3,20,000 (February 25-26) vs Rs 30,00,000 (February 18-19)

• Deluxe Garden Suite with King Bed and Pool View and Private Terrace: Rs 1,70,000 (February 25-26) vs Rs 25,00,000 (February 18-19)

Even within the same hotel, the “entry-level” five-star room roughly doubles, while the flagship suites exceed what most travelers would consider imaginable for a single night.

2) The Leela Palace, New Delhi (direct price from website)

• Deluxe Suite: Rs 1,80,500 (February 25-26) vs Rs 17,30,500 (February 18-19)

• Cheapest room available:

  • Premier Room: Rs 51,230 (February 25-26)

  • Run Of The House: Rs 3,79,700 (February 18-19)

• Run Of The House: Rs 64,560 (February 25-26) vs Rs 3,79,700 (February 18-19)

This is where the pricing story becomes particularly telling: even the cheapest category available during the summit window becomes a different product, priced for scarcity rather than “luxury value.”

3) The Oberoi, New Delhi (prices direct from website)

• Room assigned on arrival: Rs 85,000 (February 25-26) vs Rs 5,50,000 (February 18-19)

• Deluxe Suite: Rs 4,000,000 (February 25-26) vs Rs 25,000,000 (February 18-19)

At these three hotels, the top window rates are moving into seven figures for the main categories, while the same properties, a week later, are back at prices that still indicate luxury, but are in a completely different band.

The portals show the same demand shock, just through different listings

MakeMyTrip’s snapshot on Tuesday morning (around 9 am) of February 15-16 added another layer: prices were already rising even before the summit officially began on February 16.

• At The Imperial, New Delhi, a luxury suite with a bathtub was listed for a total payable of around Rs 11.64 lakh per night, including taxes.

• A room at The Oberoi, New Delhi was around Rs 5.84 lakh per night.

• A Maharaja Suite at The Leela Palace was priced at around Rs 7.34 lakh, while a Presidential Garden Suite at the Taj Palace was close to Rs 4 lakh.

• Even Le Meridien was close to 90,000 rupees for a night.

Exact room categories and dates differ from direct comparisons on the website (February 18-19 and February 15-16), but the direction is unmistakable: As soon as summit-related demand begins to squeeze availability in central Delhi’s premium inventory, the price curve steepens quickly.

Why this happens: It’s not “AI hype”, it’s event economics

The immediate trigger is simple: a short, high-profile window attracts international and institutional travelers who prioritize proximity, safety, predictability and brand assurance, and often book with organizational budgets.

This mix creates a perfect storm for luxury prices:

• Sudden concentration of demand: When a large number of delegates arrive in a tight window, hotel demand does not increase gradually; prick

• Limited high-end inventory: Delhi’s true supply of “ultra-luxury” rooms is finite. When the top layer is locked early, the remaining rooms are quickly revalued.

• Performance management in action: Five-star hotels aren’t priced like airlines, but they use a similar logic: high-demand nights are priced to maximize revenue per available room, not to maintain a stable average.

• The shortage of suites as a price lever: The sharpest jumps are consistently in suites, where there are fewer keys and where hotels know that demand from senior delegations can be relatively insensitive to prices.

The travel industry has been vocal about the summit’s linkage. Aloke Bajpai, CEO, Ixigo, wrote on X: “The India AI Impact Summit has certainly affected hotel rates in Delhi NCR. Several 5-star hotels in Delhi are going for 1 lakh+ per night between February 16-20,” Bajpai said in a post on X.

What it means for travelers: avoid dates or move out

For regular travelers, the takeaway is simple: if you’re trying to stay in central Delhi between February 16 and 20, the city is temporarily not a “normal” market. Planning around the summit dates or looking past the more premium clusters becomes the only realistic way to avoid the surge.