The five categories can be describing (loosely) as follows:
• * (one star) — low budget hotel, inexpensive, may not have maid service or room service, most people could afford to stay there one or more nights.
• ** (two stars) — budget hotel, slightly more expensive, usually has maid service daily.
• *** (three stars) — middle class hotel, moderately priced, has daily maid service, room service, and may have dry-cleaning, Internet access, and a swimming pool.
• **** (four stars) — first class hotel, expensive (by middle-class standards), has all of the previously mentioned services, has many "luxury" services (for example: massages or a health spa).
• ***** (five stars) — luxury hotel, most expensive hotels/resorts in the world, numerous extras to enhance the quality of the client's stay (for example: some have private Golf Courses and even a small private Airport).
According to the excellence in its restaurants services and express services some hotels can having the AAA and their affiliated bodies use Diamonds instead of stars to express hotel and restaurant ratings levels.
Traditional systems rest heavily on the facilities provided, which is often disadvantageous to smaller hotels whose quality of accommodation could fall into one class but the lack of an item such as an elevator would prevent it from reaching a higher categorization.
