An update on our commitment to transparency in Europe
The first results of Airbnb’s data sharing partnership with Eurostat, the statistical office of the European Commission, were published today for the years 2018 and 2019. It comes after Airbnb and other accommodation platforms signed a landmark data sharing partnership to provide European policymakers with independently published data on short-term rentals.
Airbnb is committed to being a good partner to everyone in Europe and this publication marks an important step in our commitment to transparency and providing policymakers with the information they need to regulate home sharing effectively.
This ongoing work is underpinned by our roll-out of the City Portal, which we launched last year as a first of its kind solution – built exclusively for governments and tourism organizations – with tools including Host registration and data sharing for authorities. Our goal is to have 50 European governments and authorities online with the tool by the end of 2021.
“This successful collaboration between Eurostat and the four main platforms for short-term rental accommodation is a model for providing more comprehensive and reliable statistics through access to privately held data.”
Commissioner Gentiloni, Commissioner for Economy.
“Like other European industries, the future of tourism will hinge on our collective ability to transition to a greener, more digital and resilient future. The comprehensive data on short-term accommodation rentals published today will support public authorities in developing evidence-based policies.”
Commissioner Breton, Commissioner for the Internal Market.
A New Era In Travel
Travel has fundamentally changed since the period covered by this data release as a result of the pandemic. In summer 2019, all top destinations on Airbnb were major cities. For summer 2021, our top destinations by bookings have moved beyond cities to coastal and other more rural areas:
- France: From Paris to Var
- Italy: From Rome to Sardinia
- Spain: From Barcelona to Costa Blanca
In January 2020, before the pandemic was declared and most travel restrictions were enacted, roughly 50% of nights booked on Airbnb were domestic travel. In 2021, with restrictions still in place, roughly 80% of our nights booked have been domestic travel.
Airbnb announced the biggest top-to-bottom upgrade of the Airbnb service inspired by the major shift in how people are traveling. The announcement highlighted steps that streamline and simplify the process to become a Host and will help anyone who wants to host and take advantage of the coming travel surge onboard quickly to get their first booking.
In fact, for new listings that were activated and booked in Q1 2021, 50 percent received a reservation request within four days of activation. For the year ending April 30, 2021, the average annual earnings per Homes Host who has welcomed at least one guest on Airbnb was about $9,600.
Airbnb also launched The Great Rebalance of European Travel, a series of commitments to work with communities across the region to ensure that the return of travel is safe, sustainable and benefits everyone – spreading economic benefits to more people and preventing the return of the overtourism phenomenon, where too much tourism is concentrated in too few places.
As part of its announcement, Eurostat said that data for 2020 will be available after this summer and data for the first months of 2021 will be released in autumn. We look forward to continuing our collaboration with Eurostat and to furthering our commitment to transparency as we move forward in collaboration with communities and governments across Europe.
You can read the full announcement from Eurostat here.