Luxury Hotels

Luxury hotels deliver the highest standards in service, facilities, dining, and accommodation. On Expedia, you'll find luxury hotels with 4.5-star and 5-star ratings. These are the highest possible official hotel ratings. These hotels earned their ratings and recognized status, by maintaining world-class amenities and amazing guest services with consistency.

The luxurious experience at these hotels should be seamless from the lobby through to the guest rooms -- welcoming common spaces, efficient check-in, opulent furnishings, premium bedding, efficient housekeeping. You'll often find great recreational amenities on-site as well, some of which operate 24-hours.

Luxury hotels are committed to delivering the high standard of excellence guests expect. Stay 5-star and you can rely on impeccable service, well-appointed guest rooms, superior facilities and enhanced design. Guests may also enjoy thoughtful touches such as a welcome gift or personalized service.

In general, you can expect to experience a smooth welcome, room exactly as booked (including any pre-arranged requests), dreamy bedding, luxury bath, modern in-room amenities, complimentary items, outstanding breakfast and dining, efficient staff. knowledgeable concierge and world-class recreational facilities. Additional services may be available upon request.

Though each hotel has its own style, some things that usually make an appearance are:

✓ 24-hour front desk

✓ In-room: Flat-screen TV, desk, free Wi-Fi.

✓ In-room: Complimentary bottled water. Coffee and tea facilities, mini fridge, snacks.

✓ In-room: Bathrobes, complimentary toiletries.

✓ Nightly turn-down service. 24-hour room service.

✓ Outstanding breakfast and dining.

✓ Great amenities such as swimming pool, spa or sauna, 24-hour fitness center.

✓ Services such as laundry, babysitting, pet-sitting, knowledgeable concierge

*These are only guidelines as policies and amenities vary across hotels. For more information, view details listed on each property page.

They both offer high standards of service, upscale furnishings, and a variety of amenities. 5-star hotels will have more lavish design and furnishings, impeccable first-class service, and even more amenities. For instance, you might find a really opulent lobby, spectacular swimming pools, in-room hot tubs, more guest suites, 24-hour room service and world-class dining.

Staff at a 5-star property are also more likely to offer personalized service, thoughtful touches such as a welcome note or gift, and cater to special requests.

*These are only guidelines as policies and amenities vary across hotels. For more information, view details listed on each property page.

Yes, there are 6-star and 7-star hotels -- but only unofficially. The maximum official rating recognized globally is 5-star.

Dubai's Burj Al Arab was the first to be described as a 7-star hotel, and several more have followed since. There are just a handful of hotels in the world that have been loosely classed as 6-star or 7-star, and its easy to see why -- they go all out for luxury, opulence and such unique extravagances that 5-star doesn't suffice. The term was coined as a superlative rather than an actual rating. It's meant to signify the extreme glitz that takes these hotels over the 5-star mark, so they usually skip 6 and sit at 7-stars.

At each one, privacy is paramount and you're treated like royalty. Think helicopter transfers, 24-hour butler service, personal attendants, gold-plate everywhere and a fleet of luxury cars. Maybe even yachts!

A hotel chain refers to several hotels operating under the same umbrella brand.

You know what you're getting when you stay at a luxury hotel chain. No matter where you are in the world, the brand stays true to form. Guests can comfortably expect a familiar experience at each property. As the large hotel chains can be found in many cities, they are a popular choice for many travellers.

Some of the most well-known luxury hotel chains are Hilton, Four Seasons, Marriot, Starwood, Ritz-Carlton, Intercontinental, Hyatt, Wydnham and Shangri-La.

Some boutiques are classed as luxury hotels, while others are not. It depends on the standard of the accommodation.

Many boutiques are designed to cater for high-end customers, who want to stay in an independent hotel that offer the 4-star or 5-star amenities they would expect in a luxury chain hotel. Where the d`cor, amenities and standard of service is akin to that of an upmarket hotel, a boutique can legitimately be classed as luxury.

This is very hotel-dependent as there isn't a strict benchmark. One hotel may use "superior" where another might use "deluxe" for the same definition of features.

To some extent it also depends what you consider "better", as the rooms might be identical with the only difference being lower vs higher floors, or garden vs street view. When you're searching Expedia for your accommodation, take a moment to scroll through each room's description and pictures to compare and find the best option for you. You can also read guest reviews for room recommendations.

Luxury comes in many flavours. Some luxury hotel features guests love are:

✓ Swimming pools

✓ Free airport shuttle

✓ Full on-site spa

✓ Breakfast included

✓ In-room hot tubs

✓ Great restaurant

To find your ideal luxury hotel on Expedia, start by choosing your destination and dates, enter to search, then use the filters to narrow down the selection to hotels. You can filter by budget, 4-star or 5-star properties, and in-room and on-site amenities -- so if you want a pool and spa, tick those boxes in the left-hand menu. If ocean view and a hot tub are more your thing, select those.