Hilton made a loss of $720 million during 2020, including a $225 million loss for the fourth quarter.
The figures compare with net income of $886 million for the full-year 2019 and an $81 million loss for the third quarter of 2020, when the hotel giant said it had seen some improvement.
The company reported adjusted EBITDA of $204 million for the quarter and $842 million for the full year.
Despite the ongoing impact of the pandemic, the company says it now has 97% of its hotels open.
Chris Nassetta, president and CEO of the global chain, says: "Our fourth quarter results were largely in line with our expectations as rising COVID-19 cases and tightening travel restrictions disrupted the positive momentum we saw throughout the summer and fall.
"Yet even with a challenging environment, we celebrated our one million room milestone during the quarter and achieved net unit growth of more than five percent for the year.”
The company says it has a development pipeline of almost 2,570 hotels across 116 countries and territories, 31 of which Hilton says it currently does not have any hotels in the portfolio.
Occupancy for Q4 was 41% in the U.S., a drop of more than 30 percentage points year-on-year.
In Europe, occupancy for the quarter was 28%, a drop of more than 53 percentage points year-on-year.
During an earnings call to discuss the results, Nassetta says the industry demand declines seen over the pandemic have never been seen in Hilton's 101-year history.
He adds that while visibility is difficult with 70% of bookings made within a week of travel, the company expects "pronounced recovery" in the second half of 2021 driven by leisure demand as well as transient corporate and group travel.
Nassetta also says that in the past new technologies such as telepresence have often accelerated the need to travel rather than reduced it.
"It just gives more efficiency. It ultimately speeds things up. It ultimately continues to connect the world and speed up globalization. And as a result, people need to congregate, they need to travel, they need to build relationships, they need to build cultures, they need to innovate. And those things really cannot be done as well without face-to-face opportunities."