Airbnb's 15.5% Host-Only Fee: What Changed and How to Reprice

Airbnb has moved home hosts to a single, host-only service fee: 15.5% of the booking subtotal for most listings, deducted from your payout, with no separate service fee for the guest. Hosts using property-management software switched on 27 October 2025, hosts outside the European Economic Area during 2026, and hosts in the EEA on 13 October 2026. If you kept your prices, your payout dropped by about 13%. Here is what changed, how to reprice to the cent, and what it means for your taxes.

What changed, and when

Under the old split fee, most hosts paid about 3% of the subtotal and the guest paid a service fee of 14.1% to 16.5% on top of your price. Under the host-only fee, the guest sees one price — the one you set — and the host pays the whole fee: 15.5% for most listings, 14–16% in some cases, 16% in Brazil and Mexico.

• 27 October 2025: mandatory for hosts connected to a property-management system or channel manager, worldwide.
• 2026, country by country: hosts outside the European Economic Area (the UK in June, the last ones on 15 September 2026).
• 13 October 2026: all hosts in the European Economic Area.

Bookings made before the switch keep their old terms, even for stays after it, and there is no way back to the split fee. Airbnb presents the change as neutral: it says 15.5% reflects the global average of its fees, and guests now see the final price from the first search. That holds for Airbnb. For you, it depends on whether you repriced.

VAT: 15.5% or more?

In the EU and the UK, Airbnb charges VAT on its host service fee unless you’ve added a VAT number to your account. At a 20% rate (France, the UK), the 15.5% becomes 18.6% of the subtotal. Hosts in the US and other countries without VAT on the fee pay 15.5%. The examples below use 15.5%; if VAT applies to you, use 18.6% instead.

What you lose if you didn’t reprice

Take a $100 night (the subtotal also includes cleaning and extra-guest fees, which go through the same math):

At the same price, your payout drops by 12.9% (15.6% with 20% VAT on the fee). On $20,000 of nights a year, that’s about $2,500 less for exactly the same bookings.

How to calculate your new price

Airbnb takes its fee from the price you list, so adding 15.5% to your price isn’t enough. Divide the payout you want by the share you keep: new price = payout ÷ 0.845 (÷ 0.814 if 20% VAT applies). To keep the $97 you received under the split fee, list at $114.79: that’s Airbnb’s own example, where a price moved from 100 to 115 still leaves the host 97.

The last column is the good news: for the guest, the price barely moves. Repricing doesn’t make you more expensive than the neighbours who did the same math. Three things to check:

• Cleaning and extra-guest fees are part of the subtotal: adjust them with the same formula.
• Pricing tools (Airbnb’s price-adjustment tool, PriceLabs, your channel manager): check which rate they apply, and that your minimum price moved too.
• The market: compare with listings nearby. They switched on the same day, but not all of them repriced.

What it means for your taxes

In most tax systems you report your gross booking revenue — the price of the stay before Airbnb’s fee — and deduct the fee as an expense, or rely on a flat allowance. If you raise prices by 15–18% to keep the same payout, your reported revenue rises by the same amount while your income doesn’t. That matters when you sit close to a threshold: in France, for example, the simplified micro-BIC regime for unclassified holiday rentals stops at €15,000 of revenue. Check yours with an accountant.

Airbnb, Booking.com or direct: the new comparison

With the host-only fee, Airbnb now costs about what Booking.com costs, and it shows on your payout:

• Airbnb: 15.5% of the subtotal (18.6% with 20% VAT on the fee).
• Booking.com: around 15% commission in most of Europe, plus optional programmes (Genius discounts, Preferred Partner).
• Your own site: card processing (Stripe charges about 1.5% + €0.25 for a standard European card, about 2.9% + $0.30 in the US) plus the site subscription, and no commission.

On a $114.79 night, Airbnb keeps about $17.79. The same stay booked on your own site costs about $3.50 in card fees, so you can list it 10% cheaper there and still earn more — Airbnb doesn’t require price parity. The one rule: never offer it to a guest you met on Airbnb; its Off-Platform Policy forbids that. Your site gets found elsewhere: Google, Google Maps, Instagram, word of mouth. See how to reduce Airbnb fees legally and the full direct-booking math.

HomestAI builds that site from your Airbnb or Booking.com listing in about 5 minutes, from $19 a month, with no commission on bookings. To run your own numbers, use the Airbnb fee calculator.

Bottom line

Airbnb hosts now pay the whole service fee: 15.5% of the subtotal for most listings, more where VAT applies. To keep your payout, divide it by 0.845 (0.814 with 20% VAT) and apply the result to your nightly rate and your cleaning fee: about +15% to +18%, with almost no change in what guests pay. Watch your reported revenue, which rises by the same amount. And give the guests who find you outside Airbnb a reason to book on your own site: every direct booking now earns you roughly 15–20% more than the same stay on Airbnb.