In the recent studies, the impact of hotels’ distance from city centre on room rates has been widely discussed. The aim of this paper was to depict findings from the 2009 and 2013 research conducted by the authors in the four Polish cities: Cracow, Poznan, Warsaw and Wroclaw. Hotel industry in mentioned metropolises is most developed in Poland: most of hotels are located in these cities, and the number of the hotel rooms offered in these metropolises is most significant. The authors discuss the influence of hotels’ distance from city centre on room rates. The authors consider hotel rooms offered in Cracow, Poznan, Warsaw and Wroclaw, sold in the summer and autumn 2009 and 2013, on particular days: working days and weekends. The authors’ findings are compared with results of studies carried out by other researchers for few European and Asian cities. Because of multinational aspect of cities’ competitiveness, mentioned comparison seems to be crucial. Therefore, understanding the spatial specific of the hotel room rates offered in Cracow, Poznan, Warsaw and Wroclaw might be useful for building global competitiveness of mentioned cities
