As destinations are striving to become more competitive and attract visitors and tourists, the performance of its enterprises, including the hotel industry is of paramount importance. Istanbul, as an increasingly popular city destination is no exception. As the number of hotels in this city has increased dramatically in recent years in order to cope with the demand for accommodation services of the growing number of visitors, it is imperative to examine the competitiveness of the hospitality industry in Istanbul. Despite the importance of research in this area, there is a lack of investigations that examine the competitiveness of hotels in Turkey and specifically in Istanbul. Furthermore, to date, there is no research that analyzes the competitiveness of the hospitality industry from a broad perspective, since most of the investigations focus on a specific area of the organization and its relationship with the hotel’s performance. Therefore, the study aims to contribute to the literature and provide a comprehensive view of the hotels in Istanbul, and determine their competitiveness. Moreover, the research will also attempt to establish a standard data collection instrument for Istanbul hotels that can be used in the future as a benchmarking tool and that will allow comparisons in time. The research will be carried out from different aspects and perspectives that include management practices, financial performance measures, operational indicators, employee profile and attitudes, customer profile and satisfaction, environmental practices and use and investment in technology. Furthermore, the study attempts to determine the most important factors that affect the performance of the hotels and to explore the relationship between the different variables included. Both managerial and theoretical implications will be derived.