What market share did Airbnb have last year according to the speaker?

Mark SimpsonHelping short-term rental hosts get the tools, tactics and training to grow direct bookings with confidence

IF One Channel Dominates: STR Industry Apocalypse!

11 Apr 2025 · 1 min

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Mark Simpson argues that Airbnb has become the dominant channel in the short-term rental (STR) industry—claiming it held 64% of total bookings last year—and warns that continued concentration could replicate negative outcomes seen with Uber in taxis and Amazon in ecommerce, including loss of marketing and business control for hosts/companies.

Questions this video answers

64% of total bookings in the short-term rental industry.

Chapters

Last year, Airbnb had 44%, sorry, 64% of the total bookings in the short term rental industry. So of all the bookings, Airbnb had 64%. So what that means is that Airbnb has started as a plucky upstart to catching up with Booking.com and Verbo in our industry, to overtaking them. Now, the worry with that, and my worry with that, is that if we keep going on this trend and we keep letting one channel in particular dominate our industry, we potentially could go down the same route as Uber with taxis and Amazon with ecommerce. And when that happens, you lose all the control in your marketing, in your business.