Palm Springs hotel rates, month by month
| Month | Avg. nightly rate | vs. Palm Springs average |
|---|---|---|
| Jan | $241 | +5% |
| Feb | $288 | +26% |
| Mar | $369 | +61% |
| Apr | $359 | +57% |
| May | $204 | -11% |
| Jun | $171 | -25% |
| Jul | $161 | -30% |
| Aug | $158 | -31% |
| Sep | $171 | -25% |
| Oct | $198 | -14% |
| Nov | $228 | 0% |
| Dec | $204 | -11% |
What the curve means for planners
Month choice moves the bill in Palm Springs. The same room class costs $158 a night in August and $369 in March, a 57% spread.
Against the city average of $229, August runs 31% under and March runs 61% over. That is a large enough gap to change how many nights a fixed budget covers.
If the destination is fixed but the dates are not, this is the market where it pays to schedule around the curve. Moving a multi-night group stay out of March changes the total more than most rate negotiations will.
Why do hotel prices in Palm Springs, CA move this way?
The pattern below is measured. The explanation is our read of it.
Palm Springs is a desert resort market and the curve says so. Rates peak in March at the height of the winter-spring season, when the festival and tournament calendar likely stacks onto ideal weather, then fall steeply into the brutal summer, with August at the floor. The season is the product, and the summer is the discount.
How Palm Springs compares
At $229 a night, Palm Springs, CA ranks 5 of 50 major U.S. markets by average hotel rate, 55% above the $148 median of the 50 markets in this dataset.
| Similar-priced market | Avg. nightly rate | Rank of 50 |
|---|---|---|
| Chicago, IL | $233 | 4 |
| Washington, D.C. | $252 | 3 |
| Philadelphia, PA | $205 | 6 |
Questions people ask
How much does a hotel cost in Palm Springs?
Hotels in Palm Springs, CA average $229 per night, based on 274K publicly available rates observed in searches on Engine between May 2024 and April 2026. These are par rates, meaning the cheapest public price offered at the time of each search, not negotiated or booked rates. Monthly averages range from $158 in August to $369 in March.
What is the cheapest month for hotels in Palm Springs?
August is the cheapest month for hotels in Palm Springs, CA, averaging $158 per night, which is 31% below the city's $229 average.
What is the most expensive month for hotels in Palm Springs?
March is the most expensive month for hotels in Palm Springs, CA, averaging $369 per night, 61% above the city's $229 average.
When should I book a hotel in Palm Springs?
The rates on this page are advance-purchase public rates, observed in searches made 10 to 180 days before check-in, so the bigger lever is which month you stay rather than how far ahead you book. For Palm Springs, CA, that means aiming for August and avoiding March when dates are flexible. Our full study, Every City Has a Season, covers how timing plays out across all 50 markets.
This page is one market from a 50-city study of how hotel prices move through the year.
How we did this
The figures on this page come from the 128,536,941 hotel prices that business travelers saw when searching on Engine, a platform companies use to book work trips, across 50 U.S. markets over roughly two years (May 2024 to April 2026).
What we measured. Every data point is a par rate, meaning the cheapest publicly available nightly rate a hotel offered at the moment of a live search. These are the prices companies see while planning a trip, not Engine's negotiated rates and not the prices ultimately booked. Real corporate rates typically sit below what is shown here.
Whose trips we looked at. We focused on planned travel and included only searches made 10 to 180 days before check-in, limited to business accounts, with internal, test, and promotional activity excluded.
A few caveats. These are advertised rates, not final booked prices. Monthly figures pool multiple years to smooth year-to-year noise, so an unusually large one-off event can occasionally push a single city-month higher than a typical year.
Data analysis by Jack Swiatoschik. Written by Alec Hollingsworth. Reviewed by Engine's data team.