Upcoming Hospitable and IntelliHost report suggests guests are browsing more listings, comparing more options, and taking longer to commit to stays
SAN FRANCISCO, 12 MAY 2026 – New data from short-term rental software provider Hospitable and short-term renal analytics platform IntelliHost suggests hosts and property managers are facing a growing conversion challenge as travelers compare more listings before following through with bookings.
The report suggests the challenge for hosts is no longer simply getting discovered. Instead, operators are increasingly competing for traveler confidence in an overcrowded market where guests are comparing more listings, taking longer to make decisions, and becoming more selective about where they stay.
The findings, which form part of an upcoming joint report from Hospitable and IntelliHost, show that overall search-to-booking conversion rates sat between just 1.2% and 2.4% over the last 12 months, despite listings continuing to achieve consistently strong visibility in search results.
According to the analysis, first-page impression rates remained between 41% and 45% throughout the year, peaking at 44.8% in February and March 2026. The data suggests guests are actively searching for short-term rentals, but far fewer are ultimately committing to reservations.
Hospitable and IntelliHost analyzed 12 months of Airbnb traffic and conversion data as part of the research, alongside broader benchmarking data from more than 4.1 million Airbnb listings globally.
For years, many hosts focused heavily on improving rankings and visibility under the assumption that stronger discoverability would naturally lead to more bookings. But the data suggests visibility alone is no longer enough. Instead, factors like response speed, pricing clarity, cancellation policies, communication quality, and the overall ease of the booking process are playing a growing role in whether travelers decide to commit to a stay.
Pierre-Camille Hamana, CEO and Founder of Hospitable, said: “Travelers now have almost endless choice, and that’s changing how they book. Hosts are no longer just competing for visibility; they’re competing for trust. Fast communication, pricing clarity, flexibility, and guest confidence are becoming critical conversion factors.”
Jeff Brown, Managing Partner at IntelliHost, added: “One of the clearest signals in the data was the growing gap between visibility and conversion. Listings are still being surfaced prominently in search results, but that attention is translating into bookings far less efficiently than many hosts expect. What we’re seeing is a more cautious traveler mindset. Guests are browsing heavily, comparing more options side by side, and behaving much less impulsively than they did during the post-pandemic travel surge.”
The data referenced in this release forms part of Hospitable and IntelliHost’s upcoming report, The New Rules of STR Performance, which examines conversion trends, guest behavior, cancellation risk, minimum stay strategy, and shifting seasonal demand patterns across the STR market.
The findings suggest the STR industry may be entering a new phase where operational quality and guest trust increasingly determine performance, even for highly visible listings.
About Hospitable
Hospitable is the short-term rental industry’s premier super app, empowering hosts and property managers to streamline operations, grow their businesses, and reclaim valuable time. Initially launched in 2016 as a time-saving PMS, Hospitable has evolved into a powerful toolkit that goes beyond traditional property management. The platform enables hosts at every scale to automate guest messaging with AI, optimize nightly rates, simplify rental agreements and deposits, coordinate teams, and confidently launch direct booking websites with built-in payments and property protection. Hospitable is an Airbnb Preferred Plus partner and a Booking.com Premier Plus partner. Hospitable supports tens of thousands of hosts worldwide, having automated over 108 million messages and processed $5.2 billion in reservation income in 2025. For more information, visit www.hospitable.com.
About IntelliHost
IntelliHost is an AI platform built for professional short-term rental property managers. Unlike traditional STR tools that surface data and hand it back to you, IntelliHost acts on it — automatically reviewing pricing across your entire portfolio every morning, rewriting listing titles and descriptions based on what’s actually converting in your market, and delivering owner reports without anyone building a spreadsheet. Approved changes push directly to your PMS. Results surface in Slack. The platform trains on data from 80,000+ properties and learns from every change it makes, compounding performance over time. Active users see an average 21% revenue increase with roughly 10 minutes of hands-on work per week.
