Booking Claims It Beats Airbnb With 5 Million Alternative Accommodations Listings

Booking Holdings has tallied and publicized its alternative accommodations listings for the first time, and claims its biggest brand, Booking.com, is the leader from a supply perspective with more than 5 million listings of homes, apartments, and other unique lodgings, topping Airbnb. Thus the inventory arms race is on. An Airbnb source said the company now claims 4.85 million listings, up from the previously disclosed 4.5 million at the end of 2017, and the company expects to top 5 million listings by the end of June. The compare and contrast game between publicly traded Booking Holdings and privately held Airbnb has been an apples to oranges contest until now because Booking had previously only released its property numbers while Airbnb cited its listings roster. But now, if both companies' numbers are to be believed, the tallies are easier to measure. You can consider Booking.com ahead in the listings statistical race — more than 5 million for Booking versus 4.85 million for Airbnb, but Airbnb's roster includes hotels and Booking's doesn't. When including hotels and nontraditional listings, Booking says it has 27 million. Airbnb has recently made a big push to add hotels and go head-to-head against Booking.com. Booking, in its announcement Tuesday, cited what it characterizes as "5 million reported listings" based on the number of units that owners or property managers disclose as being distributed through the online travel agency. In a Securities and Exchange Commission filing Tuesday, noted: "Reported Listings refers to the total number of individually bookable units at that property as reported to us by the property, whether or not those units are all available for booking on Booking.com at a given point in time. For example, a hotel with 100 individually bookable rooms would represent one property and 100 Re