Uncovering a Hotel Room’s Hidden Surprises

Here’s where to look to make sure your lodging is clean and safe

a magnifying glass over pillows on a bed in a hotel room

Complete an inspection before you settle into your hotel room, because unpleasant surprises could lurk beneath a seemingly clean space.

Paul Spella (Getty 2)

Veronica Stoddart and Andre J. Ellington,

Updated September 19, 2025

AARP

Published July 29, 2024

/ Updated September 19, 2025

You finally made it to your hotel room, and it’s time to relax, right? Not so fast.

These days, you can’t always assume that when you check in, your room will be clean and secure. Beneath a seemingly clean surface could lurk some unpleasant surprises.

A housekeeper now typically cleans 13 to 16 rooms a day, spending an average of 20 to 40 minutes per room, says David J. Sangree, president of consulting firm Hotel & Leisure Advisors, adding, “Sometimes the housekeepers don’t have enough time to deep clean it properly.”

Here are nine things you can do to ensure a clean, comfortable stay.

1. Look before you book

“Start by looking at review sites,” Sangree says. “A hotel with real cleanliness issues will have multiple complaints.” In a recent study by the mattress manufacturer Amerisleep of inspections of more than 3,000 hotels, online customer reviews — as well as room rates — were good indicators of cleanliness. Hotels with higher customer reviews typically had fewer general hygiene violations. And the most expensive hotels ($500 or more per night) had the fewest violations of any other price category. Meanwhile, those under $99 per night had twice as many as any other group.

2. Inspect when you arrive

Sangree advises assessing the hotel lobby, checking for dirt, stains and discolorations when you enter. These can be red flags. “Look at the elevator, the hallway. Are those clean?” says Sangree. When you enter the room, look for stains and whether the carpet has been vacuumed.

The bathroom is key. “Check the shower curtain or the glass shower panel, which should be spotless,” Sangree says. If it isn’t, “you can either request a new room or request a housekeeper come to the room and correct the problem.” This shouldn’t reflect on the entire hotel, however, as “a housekeeping staff is made up of many individuals, so just because one area may have a problem does not mean the entire building would.”

Cameron Sperance, the former senior hotels reporter for travel website The Points Guy, suggests that you run your finger across the headboard and the counter to see how deeply the housekeepers are cleaning the rooms. Check the wastebaskets, too. They should be completely empty. If they aren’t, that’s a sign that the room cleaning was not thorough.

3. Scrutinize the bedding

Even though bedbugs are relatively rare in hotels, according to Sangree, they remain a traveler’s worst nightmare. Sperance places his luggage in the bedbug-inhospitable bathroom while he checks out the room; Sean O’Neill, hotel editor for the travel industry news site Skift, puts his on the luggage rack, which is harder for the bugs to access. All three industry professionals recommend carefully inspecting the bed — including the seams of the mattress and box spring — for signs of infestation such as bloodstains, black (fecal) spots, tiny white eggs that resemble grains of rice, and for the bedbugs themselves, which are reddish-brown and the size of a lentil. Leave immediately if you find any such evidence.

As for the linens, most hotels have replaced the thick bedspreads of yore that were only cleaned once or twice a year with a white duvet or a blanket that’s washed regularly. It’s less clear how often decorative pillows and runners are cleaned. “Toss those aside,” advises Sperance. Sangree also suggests that you make sure your pillow isn’t old. “When it noticeably flops over your arm, it should be replaced.”

4. Check for mold

“It’s definitely a big issue,” says Sangree, especially in humid tropical climates. “I have been in hotels that have it.”

Often unseen, mold can cause allergic symptoms such as watery eyes, runny nose, sneezing, itching, coughing, wheezing, difficulty breathing, headache and fatigue. Populations at particular risk include older adults, immunocompromised people and those with respiratory conditions such as allergies and asthma.

Look for signs of dampness on walls and ceilings. “Use your nose and your eyes,” says O’Neill. “Mold often has a distinctive musty smell. Look for condensation, water stains, and inspect the bathroom grout for stains.” This is likelier if your bathroom doesn’t have an exhaust fan or if the fan isn’t working. “Even an older hotel should not have a musty smell,” says Sangree.

5. Consider your own allergies

If you have a severe pet allergy, you should avoid hotels that accept them, advises Sangree. But if you do have to stay at a pet-friendly property, call ahead to make sure you get a room that didn’t previously have a pet.

Guests should take all their allergies into consideration during a hotel stay. Rasheedah Williams, sales and catering manager for Cooper Hotels, says there are certain requests a guest can make, including changing specific linens in the room. For example, visitors can “request down-feather items to be removed from a room prior to check in,” she says.

Dietary restrictions should also be considered. Travelers should check with the hotel about the availability of gluten-free or vegan food options, Williams says. “As long as we have prior knowledge of the request, we can pretty much accommodate.”

The American College of Allergy, Asthma, and Immunology suggests that if someone has food allergies, they should try to reserve a hotel room with a kitchen and buy their own food to avoid any mishaps.

6. Prevent infection

“One thing that I’ve noticed in news reports every couple of months is Legionnaires’ disease,” says Sperance. This severe form of pneumonia is caused by breathing in bacteria in water spray or tiny water droplets in the air. The risk of infection is greatest in older people, smokers and those with weakened immune systems. “Because Legionnaires’ comes from stagnant water, I always run my shower for a few minutes to cycle the water through before I get in,” he says.

7. Double-check all appliances

No one wants to enter a room and find a broken iron or a nonfunctioning power outlet; too many broken appliances “could literally mess up your entire stay,” Williams says.

“The tiniest inconvenience of your daily routine can make a huge impact on your experience, whether it be for business or pleasure,” she says.

“Guests should report any issues they encounter, not just for their own comfort, but so hotel staff can fix them promptly, ideally before the next guest runs into the same problem.”When an appliance, like a refrigerator, doesn’t work, “the guest is then stuck with the inconvenience of storing their personal items [food, medicine] in a public space out of reach.”

Williams also encourages visitors to check amenities for compliance with the Americans With Disabilities Act, “for those with disabilities for both hearing and sight.”

“Guests with disabilities should verify if the hotel they’re staying at has things like visual fire alarms, accessible bathroom features or hearing aid-compatible phones,” Williams says. “If something is missing or not working, they should notify hotel management for their own stay and to help the hotel remain compliant with ADA regulations.”

Travel writer Rebecca Winke told Reader’s Digest that guests should be mindful of their cooking habits while staying in a hotel room.

“Don’t follow those crazy Instagram or TikTok stories that suggest you use the kettle to cook ramen, or the iron to toast a sandwich!” she said. “You’ll ruin the hotel’s appliances, you’ll get charged — and you’ll also create a major fire hazard.”

8. Lock down security

Beyond cleanliness, security is key to a comfortable hotel stay. The pros say you should make sure your hotel has the following:

Security cameras in public areas.
A peephole in the room door. “Use it to see who is knocking,” says Sangree. Sperance has found that “some people cover it so nobody can look in, out of an abundance of caution.”
A working secondary lock or dead bolt on the door. “Always double-lock the door and lock the window when you go to sleep,” says Sangree.
Locks on the windows, especially on the ground floor.
Key cards, which are more secure than keys, to access your room. “These are especially important at properties where it’s unclear if side entrances are always secure,” O’Neill says.

9. Take action

If you encounter a problem, O’Neill suggests following these steps.

Document it with photos. That provides a permanent record should you need it.
Act right away. Contact the front desk immediately. Don’t put up with a problem and then request a refund later. That’s much harder to do.
Escalate up the chain. Contact the general manager, owner or someone at the corporate level of a chain if you don’t get appropriate action from the front desk. Sangree suggests joining the loyalty program of the hotel chain you book, because you may have more sway as a member.

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