Summer travel plans bring sun, music and a less welcome passenger in some U.S. cities: bedbugs. This piece breaks down where infestations spiked, what the leading pest-control data show, expert cautions about reading rankings too literally, and practical steps travelers can take to avoid a nasty surprise. Read on for the cities to watch and the simple checks that can save your trip from tiny, itchy trouble.
Bedbugs are tiny blood-feeding insects that prefer to live near people, usually in places we sleep and rest like mattresses, couches and nearby furniture. Their bites can itch, irritate skin, and occasionally trigger allergic reactions for sensitive folks. Because they hide in seams, crevices and upholstery, they travel easily on luggage and clothing, turning a short hotel stay into an itch that follows you home.
Recent pest-control data put Chicago back at the top of the list for the most bedbug treatments, with Los Angeles, Detroit, Cleveland and Indianapolis filling out the top five. Popular tourist spots such as Tampa and Myrtle Beach have also seen upticks in bedbug activity, making travel timing and lodging vigilance more important than ever. If you’re heading to a big event or festival, know that more visitors can mean more chances for hitchhiking pests.
“Many cities where bedbug activity has been the worst in the last year are also some of the country’s most popular travel destinations and are expected to welcome large numbers of visitors for major concerts, festivals and sporting events throughout the summer and beyond,” companies in the pest-control industry have noted, a reminder that crowds and travel churn drive exposure. This pattern helps explain why some places keep showing up on lists year after year even as others shift up or down. Cities where traffic surges, short-term rentals, and busy transit meet are natural spots for these critters to spread.
Still, the rankings are grounded in treatment records: the lists reflect metro areas where the pest-control company performed the most bedbug treatments between May 2025 and May 12, 2026, covering both homes and businesses. That means the numbers show where professionals were busy handling infestations, not a perfect map of every single bedbug sighting. Use the lists as a red flag, not the final word on risk in any given neighborhood or hotel.
Another analysis looking at state and city risk placed Michigan at the top for estimated chance of encountering bedbugs, with Ohio, Maryland, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin also scoring high. On a city level, places like Warren, North Las Vegas and Madison showed up among the biggest hot spots in that breakdown. These kinds of reports often blend treatment data, hotel reviews and social chatter to estimate traveler risk, which can highlight trends but also skew toward areas with more reporting and resources.
“The main problem I have with these [rankings] is they make it seem like urban areas have all the bedbug problems, but from some recent work we’ve done and anecdotal reports, we know bedbugs can show up anywhere — urban, suburban or rural,” one urban entomology expert warned, pointing out a common misconception. “In fact, while people are more packed together in urban areas and thus more likely to bump into bedbugs, those living in rural areas may have less access to good pest control services and thus may find it more difficult to get rid of bedbugs,” he added. Those caveats matter: lower treatment numbers don’t always mean lower presence, just less detection or fewer available services.
Other researchers note that attention tends to follow travel: places get labeled because visitors spot and report problems while searching for a bed that doesn’t bite back. That means a sudden spike in reports may reflect more travellers and more online chatter as much as it reflects a true, long-term infestation crisis. The takeaway is to treat any single list with healthy skepticism and prepare anyway.
Practical precautions are straightforward and effective. Inspect mattress seams, upholstered furniture and behind headboards when you arrive at a hotel or short-term rental, and keep luggage elevated when possible to reduce contact with potential hiding spots. Use a sticky lint roller on clothing, upholstery and the bottoms of shoes to help detect hitchhiking bed bugs, and wash or isolate worn clothes in hot water when you get home to minimize the chance of carrying anything back with you.
