What happens when hosts are caught spying on guests? Here’s how Airbnb usually responds.
Airbnb just got a big makeover – Here’s how to use the best new features
Americans are making summer vacation plans and searching for places to stay. One of the most prominent websites to use is Airbnb, with about 70 million searches a month. But even with tons of homes available, it can be challenging to find the right place.
As summer gets into full swing, the company unveiled its most extensive website overhaul in a decade, introducing new features for searching and keeping guests safe. According to Airbnb’s Report on Travel, 42% of guests traveled to coastal areas last summer.
That puts a lot of strain on hosts and guests if they can’t find exactly what they are looking for, with guests choosing to stay longer in one place when they do find a suitable home. Other than location, the two biggest concerns for U.S. travelers are reasonable prices and safety during their stay.
These aspects played a crucial role in developing the new features available in the U.S. from today and rolling out globally during the following week. So if you are planning a trip this summer through Airbnb, here are the upgrades you’ll see:
A new way to search
The previous way of searching didn’t allow for many customizations or options. There were some options to include in your search, but the significant update now includes Airbnb Categories.
As the company explains, you’ll see 56 categories that organize homes by style, location, or proximity to attractions. When searching for a city, results are organized by categories relevant to that city.
Over 4 million homes globally fall into the 56 categories gathered from machine learning through titles, written descriptions, and structured data from hosts. By showing you unique or interesting places to stay, Airbnb says it will “help alleviate over-tourism by redistributing travel to new locations beyond the same popular destinations.”
Split your stay
If you want to explore a new city but don’t want to be restricted to one location or geographical area, Split Stays is a great option. When you search for homes and stay longer than a week, Airbnb will suggest other homes to split your time.
Wi-Fi slow? Best ways to fix Wi-Fi problems
There are plenty of reasons your Wi-Fi keeps slowing down: signal congestion, router location, firmware issues, hardware limitations or even the physical size of your home. Then again, it could just be your neighbors.
An Airbnb host got the shock of his life when his guests used 15,000 gallons of water during their stay. Why? They were running a full-blown laundry business from his property. The water bill was around $375. They paid about $1,000 for their weeklong stay.
$2,000,000,000
Cost to build the Royal Caribbean’s Icon of the Seas. The world’s largest cruise ship measures 1,198 feet in length, making this 250,800-ton giant five times larger than the Titanic. It can hold up to 7,600 guests, many of whom are getting ship-faced and a little nauti.
70% more searches
For “star bathing.” Yep, that’s a new term you need to know. Campsite booking platform Hipcamp is seeing more guests looking for a site under clear skies so they can become one with nature. It’s a little out there for me.