"So... it's like Airbnb?"
We hear this one a lot. Usually about four seconds after telling someone what we do.
It's a fair question. Both have vacation rentals on them. Both have photos of cabins you'd like to be sitting in right now. From thirty feet away, they look like cousins.
But the honest answer is no. Stays and Airbnb aren't two versions of the same thing. They do two different jobs. And once you see the difference, you'll probably realize you have room for both.
One quick thing before we get into it: this isn't a takedown. Airbnb changed how the world travels, and it's very good at what it does. We show Airbnb as a booking option right on our Listing Pages, because a lot of our hosts are on it and a lot of travelers love booking there. We're not here to replace it.
We're here to do the part it was never built to do.
The Simplest Way to Think About It
Airbnb is where the booking happens. Stays is where the decision happens.
Think about how you pick a restaurant. You don't usually discover a great new place by scrolling a reservation app. You hear about it from a friend, see it on Instagram, read about it somewhere. Then you open the reservation app and grab a table.
One is discovery. The other is the transaction. Restaurants have had both for years.
Vacation rentals mostly haven't. For a long time, the place you booked was also the only place you could look. Stays is the missing first half: the place you go to find a stay worth booking, before you decide how to book it.
Side by Side
| Airbnb | Stays |
|---|---|---|
What it is | A booking platform | A curated discovery and marketing platform |
Handles your booking and payment | Yes | No. You book with the host, on the channel you choose |
What's listed | Millions of listings, open to almost any host | A curated directory. Every property is reviewed and approved by a human |
How you search | By dates and availability | By the stay itself: type, vibe, setting, region |
Where you can book | On Airbnb | Wherever the host offers: direct, Airbnb, Vrbo, and others |
How it makes money | A service fee on each booking | Optional memberships and host marketing services. No cut of bookings |
Coverage | Worldwide | United States |
Neither column is the "good" one. They're built for different moments.
What Airbnb Does Best
Credit where it's due.
Sheer selection. If you need a place to sleep in almost any town on earth next Thursday, Airbnb will have options. Nothing else comes close on volume.
Availability search. Type in your dates and you only see what's open. When you need a place for specific nights, that's exactly what you want.
A smooth, familiar checkout. Payment, messaging, and your itinerary all live in one app you already know how to use.
Reviews at scale. Hundreds of guest reviews on a single listing tell you a lot.
Built-in support. If something goes sideways, there's a platform in the middle with policies and a support team.
If your trip is mostly about logistics (a wedding in a town you've never heard of, a work trip, a last-minute overnight), Airbnb is hard to beat.
What Stays Does Differently
We're curated
Every property on Stays has been reviewed and approved by a real person. We're looking for stays with standout design, a special location, or an experience you can't get just anywhere.
That means a much smaller directory. It also means you're not scrolling past two hundred beige condos to find the one treehouse. Think of a big-box bookstore versus the small shop where the staff hand-picks every title. One has everything. The other only has what somebody thought was worth your time.
We don't hide a great stay because it's booked
On a booking platform, the moment you enter dates, every unavailable property vanishes. That makes sense for them. It also means you may never even see the stay you would have loved most.
On Stays, a great stay is worth knowing about whether or not it's open next weekend. Favorite it. Follow it. Catch its next Offer. Plan around it instead of around a date.
We show you every way to book
A Stays Listing Page lays out every booking option the host offers, side by side: their direct site, Airbnb, Vrbo, and so on. You compare and pick.
Sometimes the best choice is Airbnb. Sometimes it's booking direct and saving the platform fees. Either way, you're the one deciding.
We never touch the booking
Stays doesn't process reservations or payments, and we don't take a cut of what hosts earn. We make our money from optional memberships and marketing services for hosts.
That changes our incentives in a way we think matters. We don't earn more if you book on one platform over another, so we've got no reason to steer you. Our only job is to help you find the right stay.
We've built things a booking platform has no reason to build
- Offers posted directly by hosts, delivered to your feed
- Private Invites, where a host can send you a deal that isn't public
- Giveaways for free stays you can enter in one click
- Trips for organizing your favorites
- Stays AI, an assistant that searches the curated directory for you
Where Stays Falls Short
We said this wouldn't be a takedown, so it shouldn't be a sales pitch either. Here's where Stays isn't the answer.
- We're much smaller. A curated directory is a smaller one, by design. If you need a specific town on specific dates, we may not have anything there.
- We're U.S. only for now. Heading to Portugal? You'll want another platform.
- We don't show live availability. You'll click through to the host's booking options to see open dates.
- We don't have our own reviews. Listing Pages link to the host's other channels, where you can read what past guests said.
- We're not in the middle of your booking. Whatever protections you get come from the channel you book through, whether that's Airbnb, Vrbo, or the host's own site. If that matters to you, book on the channel that gives you the coverage you want.
For Travelers: How to Use Both
Here's the routine we'd suggest.
- Start on Stays when the stay is the point. Anniversary, bucket-list cabin, the trip you've been talking about for two years. Browse, favorite, and build a shortlist.
- Check for an Offer. Hosts post deals on Stays that you may not see anywhere else.
- Compare the booking options on the Listing Page. Look at the total price on each channel.
- Book wherever makes the most sense for you. If that's Airbnb, great. You found a better stay and booked it the way you like.
And when you just need a bed near the airport? Go straight to Airbnb. That's what it's for.
For Hosts: This Isn't an Either/Or
If you host, please don't read this as "leave Airbnb." Keep your listing. Keep your reviews. Keep everything that's working.
Here's the distinction that matters for your business:
Airbnb is a sales channel. It's very good at closing a booking. But the guest relationship, the search ranking, and the traffic all belong to the platform. You're renting your visibility.
Stays is a marketing channel. It's where you build something you own: a Listing Page you can link anywhere, an audience that follows your property, Leads you can reach with private Invites, and Offers that steer travelers toward the booking option you prefer.
Your Airbnb link sits right there on your Stays Listing Page next to your direct booking link. Some travelers will pick one, some the other. You come out ahead either way, because they found you.
Put simply: Airbnb is a great cash register. Stays is the storefront, the sign, and the mailing list. Most good businesses have all of it.
The Bottom Line
Stays vs Airbnb isn't really a versus.
Use Airbnb when you need a place to stay. Use Stays when you want a stay worth the trip. And on the best trips, use Stays to find it and whichever booking option you like best to lock it in.
We built Stays to sit on top of the platforms you already use, not to knock them over.
