Shakira set to break records with Madrid residency: Hotel rates of $350 and thousands of extra seats on planes and trains
The Colombian singer is expected to attract 600,000 people to the 12 concerts planned in the Spanish capital, matching the scale of Bad Bunny’s recent performances
Spain’s capital had not yet recovered from the four days in which the Formula 1 Grand Prix gridlocked the city’s streets, with an economic impact close to €470 million ($542 million), and it is already bracing for the side effects of the Colombian singer Shakira’s Madrid residency, part of her ‘Las Mujeres Ya No Lloran World Tour.’
The event will gather 50,000 spectators per concert over a total of 12 days (between September 18 and October 11) at Estadio Shakira, the name chosen to rebrand the Iberdrola Music venue in the Villaverde district of Madrid. Those figures are almost identical to Bad Bunny’s ‘Debí tirar más fotos World Tour’ residency, which staged 10 concerts between May 30 and June 15 and drew around 50,000 people per night, generating revenues that approached €200 million ($230 million), according to calculations by the Association of Music Promoters.
With two days to go until Shakira’s first concert, expectations in the tourism and transportation industries are very positive based on how demand has behaved so far. Hotel booking platform SiteMinder estimates the average rate for those 12 days will be around €339 ($390), nearly 20% above the same dates in 2025, thanks to a 15% rise in bookings. Both SiteMinder and Amadeus agree that two out of three bookings will come from domestic travelers, which will mean more trips, mainly by train, from other regions of Spain. The travel technology platform highlights two milestones: Barcelona leads domestic bookings to Madrid with 12% of the total, and a 30% increase in bookings for groups of six or more people, representing 7% of the total.
As with the F1 Grand Prix, rising hotel prices have diverted much demand — especially family travel — to short-term rental apartments. The Dutch giant Booking revealed that accommodation searches for those dates have jumped 56%. A large part of that demand is domestic and heavily concentrated in family tourism.
The thousands of people arriving in Madrid will come by train and plane, so the main transportation operators have had to open up extra seats to meet the exponential increase in demand. As the official rail operator for Shakira’s tour, the French company Ouigo launched an advance sale for train tickets from €9 ($10) to any of its destinations and from €19 ($22) for the Madrid–Barcelona route, while the Irish air carrier Ryanair has put 225,000 seats on sale to Madrid, with fares starting at €29.99 ($35) if booked before September 22.
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