this week revealed its 2025 Star Awards, which this year expanded to Restaurants on Cruise Ships, as flagged first by a month ago.

FTG is the only independent, global rating system for luxury hotels, restaurants, spas and ocean cruises. The 67th annual list spans more than 2,100 properties in 90 countries.

It features 336 Five-Star, 645 Four-Star and 567 Recommended hotels; 79 Five-Star, 128 Four-Star and 64 Recommended restaurants; 124 Five-Star and 224 Four-Star spas; seven Four-Star and seven Recommended cruise ships; and three Four-Star and three Recommended cruise ship restaurants.

The ratings expanded into new destinations, including Brunei; Costa Navarino, Greece; Finland; Haikou, Xiamen and Xi’an, China; Kazakhstan; Malaga, Spain; Montenegro; Oualidia and Tamuda Bay, Morocco; Phu Quoc, Vietnam; Romania; and Salzburg, Austria.

FTG’s inaugural cruise restaurant ratings feature Celebrity (Apex and Ascent’s Fine Cut Steakhouse), The Ritz-Carlton Yacht Collection (Evrima‘s S.E.A.), SeaDream Yacht Club (SeaDream II‘s Dining Room), Silversea (Silver Origin‘s The Grill) and Windstar (Star Pride‘s Candles).

In Australia, there was only one property that scored a Five-Star rating, and that was .

Five other Australian properties were rated as Four-Star by FTG: COMO The Treasury (7th successive year), The Langham Sydney (9th year), Park Hyatt Melbourne (9th year), Park Hyatt Sydney (9th year) and The Darling (2nd year as 4-star) in Sydney.

Six Australian properties were ‘Recommended’: Four Seasons Hotel Sydney (1st year), Grand Hyatt Melbourne (9th year), InterContinental Sydney (9th year) and The Langham Melbourne (9th year).

Crown Spa Perth and The Darling Spa in Sydney were both recognised with Four-Star spa ratings.

Some key trends from FTG’s inspections:

Geographic highlights of the 2025 Awards

For the third straight year, holds strong as the destination with the most Five-Star hotels (24), adding Epic Tower at Studio City Macau and Raffles at Galaxy Macau, as well as seven new Five-Star restaurants.

gained new Five-Stars in Arizona (The Canyon Suites at The Phoenician, A Luxury Collection Resort), California (The Maybourne Beverly Hills and Olivella restaurant at Ojai Valley Inn) and Montana (RiverView Ranch and Spa Montage Big Sky).

had a strong showing, with new Five-Stars in Azerbaijan (Four Seasons Hotel Baku), France (Carlton Cannes, a Regent Hotel), Greece (Mandarin Oriental, Costa Navarino), Italy (Castelfalfi), Spain (Rosewood Villa Magna) and the U.K. (The Cadogan, A Belmond Hotel, London and Raffles London at The OWO).

In addition to winners, China added Five-Stars in (Rosewood Guangzhou) and (The Ritz-Carlton, Hong Kong). Elsewhere in Asia, new Five-Star hotels arrived in , (Capella Hanoi), and (The Paiza Collection at Marina Bay Sands).

New Five-Star hotels also came to the (One&Only Royal Mirage – The Residence in Dubai and The St. Regis Abu Dhabi) and Africa (Waldorf Astoria Seychelles Platte Island).

See the full list of honourees on ForbesTravelGuide.com.