Skift Take
The data is limited to these four online travel agencies and doesn’t include other platforms and direct bookings.
Booking platforms including Airbnb, Expedia, Tripadvisor and Booking sold about 678 million nights in short-term rentals in Europe last year. That was up 14% over 2022.
And in the fourth quarter of 2023, the platforms sold 132.4 million nights, a 22.7% jump from a year earlier, according to data from Eurostat, the statistics arm of the European Union.
Guest Nights Spent in the EU in the period 2018-2023
European Destinations Popular Among Tourists
All countries except Liechtenstein showed growth.
For the fourth quarter of 2023, Spain, France, and Italy, were top destination countries with growth rates of 28.1%, 18.5%, and 27.5%, respectively. In comparison, in 2022, the most substantial rises in nights spent were in Sweden, France, and Belgium.
The most popular regions in the third quarter of 2023 were the same as a year earlier: Jadranska Hrvatska in Croatia (23.7 million nights), Andalucía in Spain (14.0 million nights), and the French Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur (12.2 million nights).
In comparison, travelers stayed 207 million nights in vacation rentals in 2023 in the U.S.
EU’s Airbnb Law
In 2022, the EU commission said booking platforms would be required to disclose data regarding the number of users using their platforms.
In March this year, the European Parliament approved the “Airbnb law,” requiring short-term rental platforms to comply with data sharing and supervision measures. The law mandates platforms such as Airbnb, Booking, Vrbo, and HomeTogo to share data with local authorities on a monthly basis (or quarterly for smaller platforms) and conduct random verification checks to combat illegal rentals.
The shared data will include the host’s identity, contact information, rental location, and maximum occupancy details. A provisional agreement on these regulations was reached by EU negotiators from the 27 member states and the parliament in November.
And based on Eurostat’s agreement with the partner platforms, monthly regional data is published three months after the country-level data. Consequently, while the information above covers data up to December 2023, the regional data above only includes data up to September 2023. The data does not include bookings made directly with short-term accommodation providers.
