Las Vegas Casinos All In on New Hotel Rooms, High Limit Slot Lounges

^{The Wynn’s upgraded Panoramic King rooms are the model that will be replicated at Encore starting this summer. (Image: courtesy of Wynn Resorts)}

Las Vegas casino operators continue to lean into two trends to increase revenue. There continues to be a rush to upgrade high-limit slot rooms and renovating hotel accommodations.

Numerous corporations have been making these two changes over the past couple of years on the casino floor and in the hotel rooms throughout the Las Vegas Valley. There’s no end in sight to how much longer these two areas will be the focus of Las Vegas casino operators.

In 2024, hotel rooms generated more revenue than gambling at Vegas Strip casinos. While rooms were 34% of overall revenue, gambling was only 26% of revenue. Hotel rooms were 29% of revenue at off-strip casinos and 20.3% in downtown casinos.

Both of these upgrades can be considered as improvements for guests but they should also lead the casino operators to greener pastures.

Numerous casinos on and off the Vegas Strip have seen these upgrades with more on the way. 

High Limit Slot Room Upgrades

Last year, slot machines generated about twice as much revenue in Nevada and Clark County casinos than table games, according to the Nevada Gaming Control Board. While the lower-limit games accounted for the majority of that revenue, new high-limit slots can be big money-makers since they play much faster than older reel slots. 

Here’s a rendering of a new high-limit slots parlor coming soon to the Durango casino. (Image: Station Casinos)

Modernizing the high-limit slot rooms allows casino operators to seamlessly add the newest, faster-playing games. Visitors will notice fewer of the traditional slower-playing reel slot machines in the newest high-limit slot rooms.

This change isn’t only at luxury casinos. Those dedicated to Las Vegas residents are also focusing on high-end players.

Adding high-limit slot rooms is so important that it’s the main feature of the current expansion of Durango Casino. The property will be adding 120 more high-limit slots in a casino that already has a room dedicated to these games.

Over the past couple of years, Station Casinos has or is upgrading the high-limit slot rooms at Red Rock Casino, Green Valley Ranch, Santa Fe, and Sunset Station.

In late 2023, The Palazzo opened a beautiful new high-limit slot and table game lounge. The space also offers bartop gaming…and the ability to play two slots at the same time.

MGM Resorts recently upgraded the high-limit slot rooms at Aria, Bellagio, and MGM Grand. Last year Caesars Palace closed its poker room to renovate its high-limit slot room. While the new room is open, the poker room remains closed.

A brand new high-limit slot room was one of the first parts of Boyd Gaming's casino floor upgrade at Suncoast.

New Hotel Rooms Bringing the Bag to Operators

Corporations have a responsibility to shareholders to increase revenue and profits. One relatively easy way for Las Vegas casino hotel operators to boost profit is to offer new rooms.

Viva France Vegas! Caesars expects new rooms at the Paris casino resort hotel will prevent people from balking at their higher prices. (Image: Caesars Entertainment )

One of the many reasons to visit Las Vegas is that the city is always changing. New restaurants, shows, lounges, and other amenities keep the casinos feeling fresh. New hotel rooms offer a similar feeling to visitors.

It might sound like common sense, but newer hotel rooms fetch a higher price than existing rooms. Visitors see the new rooms as a posh upgrade for a vacation and are willing to pay a premium for the newest rooms in the hotels.

Caesars has been touting the new hotel rooms at the Versailles Tower in Paris Las Vegas for more than a year. During its recent earnings call, Caesars President and Chief Operating Officer Anthony Carrano said the upgraded rooms are generating a 61% premium over the former Horseshoe tower. 

Across the street at Caesars Palace, renovated hotel rooms in the Colosseum Tower and Octavius Towers are generating more than 20% more revenue. 

Earlier this year MGM Grand shared details about its 4,200-room renovation. While the project will take most of the year, 600 rooms are already available and are gaining higher prices than the older rooms, according to a recent earnings call when COO Corey Sanders said, “we'll raise our minimum rates there” when discussing the new rooms.

Executives noted last year that the company would get “creative” in upgrading Excalibur’s rooms using old MGM Grand furniture. The company will also reimagine the hotel rooms at W Las Vegas when it announces renovation plans for the recently renamed hotel tower at Mandalay Bay.

Also last year, The Venetian revealed 4,000 renovated suites as part of its multi-year, billion-dollar makeover. Across the street, Wynn Las Vegas announced it would begin renovating the suites in the Encore Tower this summer.

Similar to the high-limit slot room upgrades, room renovations aren’t only for Vegas Strip properties. Last year, 4 Queens in downtown Las Vegas announced a full-gutting rehab of its North Tower. Boyd Gaming is renovating hotel rooms at the Orleans now that it's completed upgrading those at the nearby Gold Coast.

This summer Station Casinos is set to renovate all of the hotel rooms at Green Valley Ranch. Not coincidentally, this off-strip casino already upgraded its high-limit rooms.

Wynn’s Room Renovation Plans

Listening to earnings calls offers context to the financial information the companies share. When discussing room revovations, two casino operators gave us a little insight as to how and when the changes will happen.

Wynn and Station Casinos decided to wait until summer to make their room renovations. Station Casinos expects to have all of the Green Valley Ranch rooms ready before the end of the year. 

There’s no timeline on when the Encore Tower rooms will be finished at Wynn. CEO Craig Billings explained their strategy for renovating rooms during a recent earnings call. 

“We generally do [renovations] in the summer when we have the most flexibility and most capacity,” Billings said. “We try to do it in a way where we're essentially taking out three floors at a time -- the floor being renovated and then the one above and the one below it to minimize disruption.”

Billings went on to say that there’s no timeframe for completion because they could pause renovations if there’s demand for more rooms.