AI Hotel Recommendation Survey (Hakone Edition): Which Hotels and Ryokan Do the 5 Major AI Services Recommend?

Summary

Stellagent Inc. surveyed which hotels and ryokan the major generative AI services recommend when asked about accommodation for a trip to Hakone, and in which travel scenarios each property tends to appear.

We set up five scenarios — a couple's trip, a family trip with children, an inbound (first-visit) trip, a trip with a group of young friends, and an adult family trip with parents — and asked the web UIs of ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Perplexity, and Microsoft Copilot the same questions five times each. The survey maps how accommodation providers appear on AI and which travelers they get recommended to, at a time when AI is becoming the entry point for choosing a hotel.

Metric	Result
AI services	5
Scenarios	5
AI responses	125
Recommendation slots	625
Recommendations extracted as property names	621
Non-property answers	4
Distinct properties recommended	114
Ryokan and hotels in the town of Hakone	454
Reference share of properties appearing in AI answers	approx. 25.1%
Recommendations for the top 5 properties	193
Share held by the top 5 properties	31.1%

While recommendations were spread across 114 properties, the top 5 properties accounted for 31.1% of the 621 valid recommendations, showing a tendency for AI recommendations to concentrate on a limited set of properties. Fujiya Hotel was the most recommended with 51 mentions, followed by Hakone Kowakien Ten-yu with 49 and Hakone Ashinoko Hanaori with 34. Gora Kadan received the most #1 recommendations, at 19.

The chart above may be reproduced as-is in media coverage, articles, and other materials, provided that you credit "Stellagent Inc." as the source and include a link to this page.

Recommendations also shifted clearly by travel scenario. Hakone Hotel Kowakien stood out for families with children, Gora Kadan for inbound travelers, and Fujiya Hotel for adult family trips — even within Hakone, the candidates AI raises change depending on who you travel with.

Background

Travelers no longer only compare hotels by entering conditions on booking sites. They increasingly ask AI questions like "Which ryokan in Hakone is best for couples?" or "Which hotel should we pick for a Hakone trip with elementary-school kids?"

The properties that appear in AI answers become the traveler's first shortlist. For accommodation providers, this means that rankings on search engines and OTAs are no longer the only thing that matters. Whether AI recommends your property, how it describes which travelers you suit, and whether it connects users to your official booking flow are now in question as well.

We conducted this survey of the Hakone area to clarify these emerging issues for hotel marketing in the age of AI agents.

Method

For each of the five travel scenarios, we entered the same prompt into each AI service's web UI five times, obtaining 125 responses and 625 recommendation slots in total. From each response we recorded the recommendation rank, property name, reason, best-fit traveler, suggested booking channel, and URL. For aggregation, we normalized name variants and tallied recommendation counts, #1 recommendation counts, ranking points, and trends by scenario and by AI service.

Controlling for account context

To prevent account-specific context from influencing answers, we used Temporary mode, temporary chats, or fresh chats in each AI service's web UI. Each prompt also explicitly instructed the AI not to reference past conversations or memories about the user.

Notes on the survey

This is an exploratory survey based on AI answers as of the survey dates. AI answers can vary by date and time, model, search settings, conversation history, region, account settings, and other factors. This survey does not evaluate the relative quality of any hotel or ryokan.

Scenarios

ID	Scenario	Conditions
S1	Couple's trip	1 night from Tokyo, two adults (married couple or couple)
S2	Family trip with children	1 night from Tokyo, two adults and two elementary-school children
S3	Inbound trip	First visit to Japan, one night in Hakone with a partner, English prompt
S4	Young friends' trip	1 night from Tokyo, four university students or friends in their 20s
S5	Adult family trip	Four adults — parents and their adult children — one night in Hakone

As a rule, the prompts did not specify preferences such as hot springs, meals, price, access, quietness, or photogenic appeal. This was to observe which accommodation values the AI chooses to emphasize on its own.

Prompts

The following prompts were entered into each AI service per scenario. Each prompt opens by instructing the AI not to reference past conversations or memories, to avoid account-specific context. S1, S2, S4, and S5 were asked in Japanese (shown here in English translation); S3 was asked in English as written.

S1 Couple's trip

For this question, please do not reference past conversations or any memories about me; use only the information in this message.

We are taking a 1-night, 2-day trip from Tokyo to Hakone. We are two adults, a married couple or couple. We have not decided which hotel or ryokan to stay at in Hakone.

Please recommend five options. For each, provide 1) rank, 2) hotel or ryokan name, 3) reason, 4) best-fit traveler, and 5) which official website or booking site to check, in table format. Include URLs if you know them; if not, write "URL unknown."

S2 Family trip with children

For this question, please do not reference past conversations or any memories about me; use only the information in this message.

We are taking a 1-night, 2-day family trip from Tokyo to Hakone with two adults and two elementary-school children. We have not decided which hotel or ryokan to stay at in Hakone.

Please recommend five options. For each, provide 1) rank, 2) hotel or ryokan name, 3) reason, 4) best-fit traveler, and 5) which official website or booking site to check, in table format. Include URLs if you know them; if not, write "URL unknown."

S3 Inbound trip

Please answer without referring to any past conversations or memories about me. Use only the information in this message.

I am visiting Japan for the first time and want to stay in Hakone for one night with my partner. We have not decided which hotel or ryokan to book yet. Please recommend five hotels or ryokan in Hakone.

For each recommendation, provide 1) rank, 2) hotel or ryokan name, 3) reason, 4) best-fit traveler, and 5) the official website or booking site to check. Include URLs if you know them. If you do not know the URL, write "URL unknown."

S4 Young friends' trip

For this question, please do not reference past conversations or any memories about me; use only the information in this message.

We are taking a 1-night, 2-day trip from Tokyo to Hakone as a group of four university students or friends in their 20s. We have not decided which hotel or ryokan to stay at in Hakone.

Please recommend five options. For each, provide 1) rank, 2) hotel or ryokan name, 3) reason, 4) best-fit traveler, and 5) which official website or booking site to check, in table format. Include URLs if you know them; if not, write "URL unknown."

S5 Adult family trip

For this question, please do not reference past conversations or any memories about me; use only the information in this message.

We are taking a 1-night trip to Hakone as a family of four adults — parents and their adult children. We have not decided which hotel or ryokan to stay at in Hakone.

Please recommend five options. For each, provide 1) rank, 2) hotel or ryokan name, 3) reason, 4) best-fit traveler, and 5) which official website or booking site to check, in table format. Include URLs if you know them; if not, write "URL unknown."

Recommendation Ranking

Rank	Property	Recommendations	#1 recommendations	Ranking points	Main scenarios
1	Fujiya Hotel	51	13	174	Adult family, family with children
2	Hakone Kowakien Ten-yu	49	10	161	Family with children, adult family
3	Hakone Ashinoko Hanaori	34	9	104	Couples, family with children
4	Tenseien	30	1	77	Family with children, young friends
5	Hakone Yutowa	29	13	103	Young friends, couples
6	Hakone Ginyu	25	8	94	Inbound, couples
7	Hakone Hotel Kowakien	24	16	107	Family with children, young friends
8	Tsuki no Yado Sara	24	1	58	Couples, family with children
9	Gora Kadan	23	19	107	Inbound, young friends
10	Hakone Suishoen	23	0	65	Adult family, family with children
11	Hotel Okada	20	2	60	Family with children, adult family
12	Toki no Yu Setsugetsuka	17	0	36	Adult family, family with children
13	Yama no Chaya	14	0	32	Inbound, couples
14	Fufu Hakone	14	2	48	Couples, inbound
15	Hakone Hotel	14	1	45	Young friends, family with children

*Ranking points were tallied as 5 points for #1, 4 for #2, 3 for #3, 2 for #4, and 1 for #5.

According to materials published by the town of Hakone, there were 454 ryokan and hotels in the town as of fiscal 2024. The 114 properties that appeared in AI answers in this survey correspond to roughly 25.1% of that figure as a reference comparison. Note that AI answers may include properties outside the town of Hakone or properties whose location requires verification, so this ratio is a reference value prior to location vetting.

*The number of ryokan and hotels in the town is based on p.3 of "Materials 1: Current State of Tourism and Fiscal Outlook," 2nd Hakone Tourism Community Development Funding Review Meeting, town of Hakone (held August 6, 2025; PDF, confirmed July 8, 2026).

Trends by Scenario

S1 Couple's trip

Property	Recommendations
Tsuki no Yado Sara	11
Hakone Ashinoko Hanaori	10
Hakone Kowakien Ten-yu	8
Hakone Yutowa	8
Fufu Hakone	7

For couples, recommendations leaned on contexts such as open-air baths in guest rooms, modern stays, views, and anniversary use, along with relatively new properties and easy-to-stay resort-style facilities.

S2 Family trip with children

Property	Recommendations
Hakone Hotel Kowakien	16
Hakone Kowakien Ten-yu	15
Tenseien	14
Hotel Okada	14
Fujiya Hotel	12

For families with children, the AIs emphasized play elements such as the Yunessun spa resort, access from stations, kid-friendliness, buffets, and the reassurance of large ryokan.

S3 Inbound trip

Property	Recommendations
Gora Kadan	15
Hakone Ginyu	14
Yama no Chaya	10
Hakone Kowakien Ten-yu	9
Hyatt Regency Hakone	8

For inbound travelers, properties offering a traditional ryokan experience, expected English support, historical character, and international recognition tended to be recommended.

S4 Young friends' trip

Property	Recommendations
Hakone Yutowa	13
Tenseien	9
Fujiya Hotel	7
Hakone Ashinoko Hanaori	7
Hakone Hotel	6

For groups of young friends, the AIs valued price, access, large communal baths, buffets, on-site facilities, and rooms that groups can easily share.

S5 Adult family trip

Property	Recommendations
Fujiya Hotel	21
Hakone Kowakien Ten-yu	12
Toki no Yu Setsugetsuka	9
Hakone Suishoen	7
Hakone Yutowa	6

For adult family trips, support went to access and room size, plus historic properties, easy access to hot springs, and dining formats that work even when preferences differ across generations.

Differences by AI Service

AI service	Valid recommendations	Distinct properties	Most-recommended properties
ChatGPT	125	32	Hakone Yutowa, Hakone Suishoen, Fujiya Hotel
Claude	125	35	Fujiya Hotel, Hakone Yutowa, Hakone Kowakien Ten-yu
Gemini	125	32	Hakone Kowakien Ten-yu, Fujiya Hotel, Hakone Ashinoko Hanaori
Perplexity	121	51	Tenseien, Tsuki no Yado Sara, Fujiya Hotel
Copilot	125	31	Hakone Ginyu, Hakone Ashinoko Hanaori, Hakone Suishoen

The chart above may be reproduced as-is in media coverage, articles, and other materials, provided that you credit "Stellagent Inc." as the source and include a link to this page.

The properties recommended differed by AI service. Perplexity recommended the most distinct properties at 51, spreading its recommendations relatively widely. Copilot, ChatGPT, and Gemini each stayed in the low 30s, concentrating recommendations on a more limited set of properties.

Non-Property Answers and Extraction Notes

Category	Count	Treatment
Recommendations extracted as property names	621	Included in the property ranking
Non-property answers	4	Excluded from the property ranking
Total recommendation slots	625	All slots obtained from AI answers

Non-property answers were returned not as specific hotel or ryokan names but as booking sites, groups of properties, curated feature pages, and the like. This confirms that even when users ask for property names, not every slot in an AI answer necessarily returns a specific property. All 4 such answers in this survey came from Perplexity.

We also recorded the booking sites and URLs included in answers, but the booking-channel classification for the 125-response dataset is outside the scope of the finalized tallies at the time of publication. This page focuses on the concentration of property recommendations and trends by scenario.

Implications for Hotel and Ryokan Operators

As AI agents come to assist travelers with hotel selection, accommodation providers will need to respond in the following ways.

1. Organize property information so AI can understand it

It is important to clearly organize, on your official website, information such as rooms, hot springs, dining, access, suitability for children, group friendliness, and fit for multi-generation trips.

2. Check how you appear in each scenario

The same property looks different on AI depending on the scenario — couples, families with children, inbound travelers, young friends, or adult family trips. You need to know in which scenarios you get recommended and in which you rarely appear.

3. Make your official booking flow easy to reach from AI

Even when an AI answer presents your official site, it is not guaranteed that users can smoothly proceed to availability search, plan comparison, membership sign-up, and booking completion. Designing the path from AI-mediated travel consultation to official booking as a single flow is essential.

4. Reduce information that is easily misunderstood

Features limited to specific plans, seasons, or room types may be overgeneralized in AI answers. Clearly stating conditions on your official site reduces gaps with traveler expectations.

Notes and Limitations

• This is an exploratory survey of 5 AIs × 5 scenarios × 5 runs and is not intended for statistical generalization.
• AI answers can vary by date and time, model, search settings, conversation history, region, account settings, and other factors. This report is based on AI answers as of the survey period (July 1–2, 2026).
• Prices, availability, and plan contents fluctuate and were not evaluated.
• The comparison with the number of ryokan and hotels in the town of Hakone is a reference value prior to location vetting, as AI answers may include properties outside the town or properties whose location requires verification.
• This survey does not evaluate the relative quality of any hotel or ryokan.
• Product and service names mentioned in this report are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective owners.

Revision History

• July 8, 2026: First edition published