OTA Commission Rates 2026: Booking.com, Airbnb, Expedia

The short answer: In October 2026 Airbnb charges most hosts a single 15.5% fee. Vrbo’s help page lists 12% commission plus a 3% payment processing fee, and a fixed 12% commission is reported to start on 29 October 2026. Booking.com and Expedia do not publish a rate: it sits in your contract. A standard UK card payment on your own website costs 1.5% plus 20p with Stripe. We checked every figure on 1 October 2026.

Part of our guide to direct bookings and OTA independence.

Most guides to OTA commission rates quote a range and leave you to guess which end you are on. This one gives the figure each platform publishes, the date we checked it, and a link to the page it came from. Where a platform does not publish a rate, the table says so. To turn a percentage into a yearly bill for your own properties, use our OTA commission calculator.

Fees checked against each platform’s own pages on 1 October 2026. We recheck this page every quarter. The next scheduled check is January 2027.

What do OTAs charge UK hosts in 2026?

Platform	Who pays	What the platform publishes	Source
Airbnb, single (host-only) fee	Host	15.5% for most hosts. Airbnb says the remaining hosts typically pay 14% to 16%, and 16% in Brazil and Mexico. Mandatory for most hosts, including serviced apartments and hosts who use property management software	Airbnb service fees
Airbnb, old split fee	Host and guest	Hosts paid 3% (most hosts). Guests paid a separate 14.1% to 16.5% of the booking subtotal. Being phased out	Airbnb service fees
Booking.com	Property	No published rate. The exact percentage “depends on your country, property type and the accommodation agreement” you signed	Booking.com: understanding your commission
Vrbo, pay-per-booking	Host	12% commission plus a 3% payment processing fee. Guests pay a separate service fee	Vrbo: pay-per-booking fees
Expedia	Property	No published rate. Each property agrees a “Compensation Percentage” of the Total Room Price in its lodging agreement	Expedia Lodging Agreement (template)

All five rows were checked on 1 October 2026.

Airbnb: one fee instead of two

Airbnb is combining the host and guest fees into “a single 15.5% service fee paid by hosts” (Airbnb Resource Centre, published 7 July 2026). Airbnb’s own example: if you keep your price at £100, you earn £84.50 after the fee, and the guest still sees £100.

Airbnb gives two deadlines for adjusting prices: 15 September 2026 for hosts outside the European Economic Area, and 13 October 2026 for hosts inside it or in Switzerland. The UK is outside the EEA, so the September date applies on that page. A separate Airbnb article for hosts who use property management software (published 29 July 2026) gives 13 October for those not yet switched. Check the Payments section of your own account to see which structure you are on.

VAT can sit on top. Airbnb’s worked example for a host in a 20% VAT country who is not VAT-registered adds VAT to the fee: on a £115 price the fee is £17.83 and the VAT on it is £3.57. A VAT-registered host who self-assesses VAT does not have it added. Airbnb’s fee page also says the fee shown is “VAT inclusive, where applicable”, so read a real payout statement before you model your costs.

Booking.com: the rate is in your contract

Booking.com says the percentage depends on your country, property type and the agreement you signed. You can find yours in your accommodation agreement, or in the extranet under Finance, Reservation statements. The Preferred Partner Programme (Booking.com describes it as “a small increase in commission”) and Visibility Booster add a percentage on top of your base rate, so a reservation statement showing more than your contract rate may mean you are in one of them (Booking.com). The rate is locked when the guest books, so a change in your rate does not touch older reservations.

Third-party guides often quote 15% as typical for Booking.com. Booking.com does not publish that figure on the pages we checked, so we have not put it in the table.

Vrbo: 12% on its help page, and a fixed 12% reported from 29 October

Vrbo’s help page states a “flat, all-in 12% commission fee” on the rental amount and any extra fees you charge, such as cleaning, pet and boat fees. The same page lists a 3% payment processing fee on the total payment, including taxes and refundable damage deposits. If you refund a deposit, the processing fee on it comes back to you. Because the page calls the 12% “all-in” and still lists the 3% separately, it does not make clear whether the 3% is on top. For hosts who use property management software, the page says 12%, and “in some regions, such as Europe, Australia, or New Zealand, you may be charged 12%-15%”. It also says bookings that come through Vrbo’s expanded distribution partners may carry higher fees, and tells you to check your Owner Dashboard for the rate that applies to your listings.

One sentence on that page still mentions a 5% commission, which conflicts with the 12% stated everywhere else on it. We have used 12%.

Short Term Rentalz reported on 30 September 2026 that Expedia Group will move Vrbo partners to a fixed 12% commission from 29 October 2026, except partners in specific regions who already pay more than 12%, and that partners on the old annual subscription will move to pay-per-booking. We have not seen Expedia Group’s own notice. Because the change is dated 29 October, we cannot confirm which rate Vrbo applies to bookings made before then, so check your Owner Dashboard.

Expedia: a percentage you agreed, not one you can look up

Expedia’s lodging agreement defines your cost as the Compensation Percentage of the Total Room Price for each room night. The figure is agreed per property and is not in the template. How it is collected depends on the payment model:

• Expedia Collect: the guest pays Expedia. You receive the Total Room Price minus the Compensation, and Expedia pays undisputed amounts within 30 days of an electronic payment request.
• Hotel Collect: the guest pays you. You then pay Expedia the Compensation. If you have not paid within 15 days of the payment request, you may face a late charge of the lower of 2% or the legal maximum for each month overdue.

What does the commission apply to?

The headline percentage is only part of the bill. Booking.com and Vrbo both publish what sits under it:

• Extra fees. Booking.com charges commission on the room rate plus fees you add, such as cleaning and service fees. Vrbo does the same for cleaning, pet and boat fees.
• VAT. Booking.com does not charge commission on local taxes such as city tax, but says that “in most countries, commission is charged on VAT or GST”. If you are VAT-registered, that raises the commissionable amount.
• Cancellations and no-shows. On Booking.com, non-refundable and partially refundable bookings are charged whether or not the guest stays, and so is any cancellation or no-show fee you charge. Mark changes in the extranet within 48 hours of check-out or you are charged full commission on the original booking. Expedia’s agreement also entitles it to its percentage of any no-show or cancellation amounts charged to guests.
• Overbookings. Booking.com charges commission because the room was on sale, and asks you to cover the guest’s relocation. It waives the commission if your property has been live for less than 30 days or you have had fewer than five overbookings in the last 12 months.
• Unpaid invoices. Booking.com says unpaid commission invoices may temporarily close your property.

What do payment fees add?

Channel	Payment fee	Source
Booking.com, Payments by Booking.com	No set-up fee. A percentage of the value of each completed reservation, charged only on bank-transfer payouts. The percentage depends on your property’s location and Booking.com does not state it on the page. If you are paid by virtual credit card, you pay a per-reservation fee to your own bank or payment provider	Booking.com: Payments
Vrbo	3% of the total payment, including taxes and refundable deposits	Vrbo: pay-per-booking fees
Expedia	No fee stated for Expedia Collect. For Hotel Collect, Expedia may charge a fee if it agrees to you using a third-party payment processor	Expedia Lodging Agreement (template)
Airbnb	No separate fee: the service fee above is the only host fee on Airbnb’s fee page	Airbnb service fees
Your own website, using Stripe as the example	1.5% + 20p for standard UK cards, 2.8% + 20p for premium UK cards, 2.5% + 20p for EEA cards, 3.15% + 20p for other international cards, plus 2% if currency conversion is needed	Stripe UK pricing

All rows were checked on 1 October 2026. Your booking engine may use a different payment provider, so check its rates.

What does a £400 stay cost on each channel?

This example is ours, not a platform’s. It uses a £400 booking subtotal (three nights at £120 plus £40 cleaning) and ignores tourist tax and deposits.

Channel	Fee on £400	You keep	Notes
Airbnb, single fee at 15.5%	£62.00	£338.00	Matches Airbnb’s own £100 to £84.50 example
Airbnb, single fee plus 20% VAT on the fee	£74.40	£325.60	Airbnb’s worked example for a host in a 20% VAT country who is not VAT-registered. Check a real payout statement to see if it applies to you
Airbnb, old split fee	£12.00 (3% host fee)	£388.00	The guest also paid £56.40 to £66.00 (14.1% to 16.5%), so the guest saw £456.40 to £466.00
Vrbo, 12% plus 3%	£60.00 (£48.00 + £12.00)	£340.00	The guest’s service fee is on top and is not counted. Vrbo’s page calls the 12% “all-in”, so the fee may be £48.00 if the 3% is already included
Booking.com or Expedia at 10%	£40.00	£360.00	Illustrative rate, not a published one
Booking.com or Expedia at 15%	£60.00	£340.00	Illustrative rate, not a published one
Booking.com or Expedia at 20%	£80.00	£320.00	Illustrative rate, not a published one
Direct, standard UK card via Stripe	£6.20	£393.80	Excludes the cost of your website and booking engine

Each percentage point of commission costs £4.00 on this stay. Over a year, the same arithmetic scales quickly. Using the calculator’s default inputs (5 properties, £120 a night, 70% occupancy, 15% of bookings direct, 15% commission), OTA bookings come to £130,305 a year and commission to about £19,546. Each extra point of commission on those bookings costs about £1,303.

What do OTAs cost you beyond the commission?

Some costs never appear on an invoice. We cannot put a verified figure on them, so we describe them rather than price them.

Rate parity. OTA contracts can limit what you may charge elsewhere. The terms differ by platform and contract, so read yours. Our rate parity guide covers what you can offer direct.

Visibility programmes. Preferred Partner, Visibility Booster and similar programmes raise your commission in return for placement. They raise dependency as well as cost, because the more bookings come through the platform, the harder it is to step back.

Guest data. A guest who books on an OTA often arrives without an email address you can use for marketing. Each booking starts from zero, which is why email marketing to past guests is one of the cheapest ways to win repeat stays.

Brand. On an OTA your property is one listing among thousands. On your own site it is your brand, your story and your photos.

If you run extended stays or corporate lets, there is a further point: corporate clients often cannot book through OTAs at all. The corporate SA pricing model covers the rate structure, the VAT treatment of 28+ night stays, and why the direct channel matters for operators in that market.

How do you work out your own OTA commission bill?

1. Download the last 12 months of commission invoices or reservation statements from every platform. They show your real rate, including any programme uplifts.
2. Note the rate on each channel and what it is charged on: room rate only, or extra fees and VAT as well.
3. Enter your numbers in the OTA commission calculator to see the yearly cost and what shifting bookings to direct would save.
4. Decide which direct channel to build first. A direct booking website that converts comes first, then Google free booking links, then the full plan to reduce OTA dependency.

What we could not verify

We dropped anything we could not confirm against the platform’s own page on 1 October 2026:

• Booking.com’s and Expedia’s commission percentages. Neither is published.
• The percentage Payments by Booking.com charges on bank-transfer payouts. The page says it depends on location and gives no figure.
• Vrbo’s guest service fee percentages. Vrbo says only that the percentage varies with the reservation amount.
• The date UK Airbnb hosts moved to the single fee. Airbnb’s pages give deadlines, not each host’s switch date.
• Which Vrbo rate applies to bookings made before 29 October 2026, whether the 3% processing fee is charged on top of the 12%, and whether the fixed 12% from that date changes any UK rate. Vrbo’s help page calls the 12% “all-in” but still lists the 3% separately, and only secondary reports give the date.

Sources

All checked on 1 October 2026.

• Airbnb service fees, Airbnb Help Centre
• Simplifying service fees on Airbnb, Airbnb Resource Centre, 7 July 2026
• Simplifying Airbnb service fees (property management software hosts), Airbnb Resource Centre, 29 July 2026
• Understanding your commission, Booking.com for Partners
• Payments by Booking.com, Booking.com for Partners
• Preferred Partner Programme, Booking.com for Partners
• About the pay-per-booking model, Vrbo Help
• About Vrbo’s service fee, Vrbo Help
• Expedia Group to introduce Vrbo compensation model change, Short Term Rentalz, 30 September 2026
• Expedia Lodging Agreement (template), Expedia Partner Central
• Stripe UK pricing, Stripe

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the average OTA commission rate for serviced apartments?

No platform publishes an average. Airbnb publishes 15.5% for most hosts, Vrbo publishes 12% plus a 3% processing fee, and Booking.com and Expedia set the rate in your contract. Your invoices show what you actually pay, including any programme uplifts.

Does Airbnb still charge guests a service fee?

Not on the single fee structure. Airbnb combines both fees into one 15.5% fee paid by the host, so the guest sees your price with no service fee added. Airbnb says the old split structure is being phased out and cannot be reselected once you switch.

Is commission charged on cleaning fees and VAT?

Booking.com charges commission on cleaning and service fees you add, and in most countries on VAT, but not on local taxes such as city tax. Vrbo charges its commission on the rental amount and fees such as cleaning, pet and boat fees. Taxes and refundable deposits carry only Vrbo’s 3% processing fee.

How do I find my Booking.com commission rate?

Look in your accommodation agreement, or in the extranet under Finance, Reservation statements. If a statement shows a higher percentage than your contract, you may be in a programme such as Preferred Partner or Visibility Booster.

Is Vrbo still on an annual subscription?

Vrbo’s help page describes the pay-per-booking model. Short Term Rentalz reported on 30 September 2026 that Expedia Group will move partners on the legacy subscription to pay-per-booking at 12% from 29 October 2026. Check your Owner Dashboard for your own position.

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