What do service fees pay for?

At a Host Q&A event in Sydney, Australia, Ben, a Superhost from Brisbane, asked a great question: What happens to the service fees Airbnb collects from hosts and guests?

As a host, you’re charged a service fee whenever a reservation is confirmed. For hosts who offer accommodations, the fee amount is usually 3%, and for hosts of Airbnb Experiences, it’s 20%. In most cases, guests are also charged a service fee when they book a stay on Airbnb. You can learn more about the different service fees we charge to some hosts in the Help Center.

So—what happens to the money that’s collected? We invest it in products and services that help support you as a host and an entrepreneur. These include marketing to help drive demand for bookings, product development to provide tools to make hosting easier, and community support. Here’s some more info about how your fees are used:

To help make sure travelers think of Airbnb when they’re planning a trip or an experience, we invest heavily in marketing and work to make sure Airbnb listings appear high in web search results. This means there’s a consistent stream of guests coming to Airbnb. For example:

• We promote Airbnb through Facebook, Google, and elsewhere
• Guests receive direct communication from us, including reminders after a search to finish the booking process
• We also publish inspirational articles and other content on our app and website to help guests feel excited to discover new spaces or participate in unique activities

Our marketing efforts have been a success. In 2019, more than 70% of millennials in the U.K. said they had talked about Airbnb in the past two weeks,* and in 2018, we became the most searched accommodations brand on Google.** This just means that you have more opportunities to host guests from around the world.

From identity verification to listing management tools, we handle the logistics so you can focus on hosting. And if you want to expand your business, we develop new products that make it easier for you to host and use data to highlight opportunities for you to earn more. A few examples:

• Our global Resource Center, launched in early 2020, offers hosting tips and guidance curated from top hosts around the world, as well as up-to-the-minute news from Airbnb
• Tools like the Opportunities tab help you stay up to date on the things guests are searching for, so you can adjust your listing accordingly
• The inbox and message center allow you to communicate with your guests easily, and new features like scheduled messaging help to streamline your day-to-day hosting tasks
• Pricing insight emails help you understand what guests are paying for listings like yours and help you set competitive prices that adjust to customer demand

We’re here to support you if you have questions or concerns. As we mentioned in a recent Host Update, we're investing a substantial amount of resources into expanding our Community Support team.

We're working on creating a stronger support system to better ensure we’re there when you need us. For instance:

• We’ve been adding more customer support staff to meet the needs of hosts and guests as travel rebounds
• We restored priority phone support for Superhosts, and we're prioritizing urgent issues for hosts and guests with upcoming bookings
• We fast-track emergency safety issues
• You can expect to receive a response on our online chat system within an average of two minutes
• We've expanded our hours of operation for our chat system, and we currently support chat capabilities in English, Spanish, Portuguese, and Mandarin

We’ll continue to make improvements and invest in our Community Support team to handle your issues more quickly and effectively whenever you need us.

From marketing and product development to community support, we're always working to partner with you more effectively, so you can focus on what you do best—providing great hospitality. We’ll take care of the rest.

*According to a YouGov BrandIndex Word of Mouth study from 2019