Airbnb’s new features make it easier than ever to find the right home for your trip

08.11.2023 - 18:55 / thepointsguy.com

Airbnb just launched a series of new features to help both travelers and Airbnb Hosts — the people who rent out their rooms, entire homes, castles, tree houses and nearly everything in between.

This new release is helping answer the question that many people have had when considering booking an Airbnb lately: Isn't it just easier to get a hotel?

"[At] a hotel, you understand absolutely what it is that you're going to get," Catherine Powell, Airbnb's global head of hosting, told TPG. "What is so amazing about Airbnb is how unique all our listings are, but that uniqueness makes it challenging to understand." She noted that users can often wonder if the listing they booked was the right choice for them specifically.

Related: How to earn cash back or points when booking Airbnbs, Vrbo rentals, hostels and more

The new features will help people better find and book the perfect Airbnb for their stay out of the whopping 7 million listings on the home-sharing platform. Features include a handy badge that will alert users that a listing has met a series of qualifications to make it a "Guest favorite," an updated ratings and reviews experience, and new tools to help hosts make their listings as descriptive as possible.

For Powell, who recently listed her own Malibu guest house on Airbnb, these new features can better help hosts fully share what's on offer (and what isn't) at their listing; this will then help guests find exactly what's right (and isn't right) for their stays.

As for her own place, Powell is well aware of how much work, care and attention goes into creating an amazing experience — but it's worth it. "Nothing beats actually being a host and the effort that goes into creating that great guest stay and wanting to meet guest expectations."

Here are a few highlights from Airbnb's new additions.

Now, while searching for listings on Airbnb, you might see a small badge displayed on search results that reads "Guest favorite." That badge indicates that the listing is one of 2 million Airbnbs with sky-high ratings from past guests and near-zero cancellations or service incidents.

The badge, Powell explained, is dynamic and refreshes every day to account for the volume of new reviews that are continuously coming in. "Every minute, 100 five-star reviews are left on the platform," she said.

She also noted that homes with a guest favorite badge have an average 4.9-star rating and can't be considered for the badge until they've received five reviews.

"It's an easy badge to see, so you will know this is something that guests love [or] most loved, so I'm gonna book that," Powell said.

One new feature TPG thinks travelers will love is the ability to more easily comb through reviews and understand past guests'