How to Do the Hotel Lobby Trend: 3 Ways, Step by Step (2026)

Press coverage says the trend uses tools like Starrd, Summrs and CapCut templates (Complex). Dedicated two-photo sites followed within days.

This is the two-photo way, step by step, on Hotel Lobby Video (rapaivideo.net). The screenshots are the real generator on a phone, taken on 16 October 2026 with two AI-made people. It works the same on a computer.

Step 1: Add two photos

Tap each photo slot and pick one photo per person: face clear and well lit, waist up or full body, no sunglasses. The left photo raps into the mic and the right one hypes. With one picture of you both, switch Two photos to One photo. The photos do not need to be taken together.

Step 2: Keep the Hotel Lobby stage and sound

Leave the stage on Hotel Lobby. Tap Change on the sound row to open Soundtrack & moves: Hotel Lobby original keeps the booth routine and the Hotel Lobby track. Here you can also pick your own song (the lead lip-syncs to it), your own clip (your pair copies its moves) or, on a Seedance model, an AI rap about a topic you type.

Step 3: Pick the format, length and quality

Tap Change on the Wan 3.0 row to open Video settings. Choose 9:16 for TikTok and Reels or 16:9 for YouTube, 5, 8, 10, 12 or 15 seconds, and 480p, 720p or 1080p. Every option shows its credits, and the price on the button follows what you pick.

Step 4: Create the Hotel Lobby AI video

Tap the button. It reads Create video with the credits. You sign in with Google, and if your balance is short the price sheet opens; once you pay, the video starts by itself. A 12-second video at 480p is 6 credits.

Step 5: Wait, then download the MP4

A render usually takes about 5 to 15 minutes. You can close the tab: the video keeps rendering and waits in My videos. Then tap Download MP4. On an iPhone the file goes to Files › Downloads; open it, tap Share and choose Save Video to put it in Photos. Credits are paid when you create, so the download has no watermark, and a failed render is refunded automatically. With Wan 3.0 and Hotel Lobby original, the Hotel Lobby track is already in the MP4; if you add a platform sound when posting, check that the two tracks do not overlap.

Two of our own renders with AI-made people, made through the same pipeline as the site, both with the Hotel Lobby track: a 16:9 video at 480p, 10 seconds, and a 9:16 one at 480p, 10 seconds, with a corgi as the partner. Each is one render, not a promise of every result.

Our render

Our render

And two Hotel Lobby AI videos from TikTok, credited to their creators below: two cats at the mic, one of the most watched versions, and two friends who put themselves in the booth.

General AI video models can make the scene if you describe it well and give them both photos. Dreamina (CapCut) publishes copy-paste prompts for its Seedance 2.5 image-to-video model, for example. The prompt has to pin down four things: the orange booth, the single hanging mic, who stands left and right, and what each person does.

We publish the exact prompt our generator uses, line by line, in the Hotel Lobby AI prompt guide, with five more for tools that take only two photos: a couple, best friends, a grandparent and grandchild, illustrated characters and pets.

Partly. Rendering AI video costs money, so free options come with limits. What each tool’s own page said on October 15, 2026:

• Hotel Lobby Video: no free video. Every render is paid with credits (6 for a 12 s video), and a failed render is refunded.
• Kapwing: the free plan exports with a watermark at 720p, but you bring the AI clip yourself.
• Fuzana: a free booth photo preview without an account; the video needs a credit pack.
• LightX: the free Starter plan gives 6 AI credits a day; its paid plans work out to about 50 credits a video.
• Dreamina: may give free credits or trial access to eligible accounts.

The full list with prices is in Best Hotel Lobby AI video generators, every free route, tool by tool, is in Hotel Lobby AI free, and what each app makes is in Hotel Lobby AI apps compared.

• CapCut: a template pastes your face onto an existing clip, usually one face, with the original song. The most-used “hotel lobby” templates on CapCut’s site predate the AI trend. Details in the Hotel Lobby CapCut template guide.
• Higgsfield: Genjutsu recasts the original clip with your photos through a community preset; a 15-second video costs 40 to 144 credits. Steps and prices in Higgsfield Hotel Lobby.
• Phone apps: no app is called Hotel Lobby, but MIU AI, Pose, PixVerse Lite, FaceLab and Photo Dance run Hotel Lobby events until late October 2026. On Hotel Lobby Video nothing needs installing; it runs in the phone’s browser.

Two creators show the Higgsfield route in their own words below: one asks Claude, connected to Higgsfield, to recast the clip with two characters; the other uses Higgsfield’s motion transfer with his own photos.

• Faces decide the result. Front-facing, evenly lit photos with nothing covering the face work best.
• Waist up or full body carries the outfit over; a tiny face in a group shot does not.
• Put the more expressive person on the left. The lead carries the performance; the partner reacts.
• Pick 9:16 before you create if the clip is for TikTok or Reels, so nothing important gets cropped later.
• For your own audio, choose a part that starts on a word rather than on silence.

• Post it vertical, 9:16, on TikTok, Instagram Reels or YouTube Shorts.
• The default video already plays the Hotel Lobby song. If you made an AI rap or used your own song and want the original on the post, add the official “Hotel Lobby” sound from the app’s music library when you upload, if it is available in your region.
• Label it as AI. On TikTok, tap More options before posting and turn on AI-generated content (TikTok Help). On YouTube, under Attributes in the upload details, answer Yes to AI use when the result looks real (YouTube Help). Instagram asks you to use its AI label on realistic AI video (Meta).
• Tag it #hotellobby so people following the trend find it.

The same trick works for other dances and skits. On Hotel Lobby Video, open Soundtrack & moves and upload your own clip of 2 to 15 seconds: the two people from your photos copy its moves on the stage you pick, with the clip’s own sound, the Hotel Lobby track or your own song. The video follows the clip’s length. Use clips you have the right to use.

Takeoff died in November 2022, and some fans object to AI copies of him and to people’s faces being used without permission (Complex, XXL). Keep the trend to people who agreed to be in your video, never minors without a guardian, and never to make a real person appear to say something they did not.