Airbnb’s anti-party system is in effect for the Memorial Day and Fourth of July weekends. In 2023, approximately 67,500 people were blocked from booking entire home listings in the United States over the Memorial Day and Fourth of July weekends due to these defenses.
As travelers get away to enjoy the long holiday weekends this summer, Airbnb is bringing in machine learning technology across the US for Memorial Day and Fourth of July to promote responsible stays. This technology will block certain bookings over these holidays with the aim of reducing the risk of disruptive parties. Last year, these defenses saw approximately 67,500 people across the United States deterred from booking an entire home listing on the platform across both weekends.
Disruptive parties are banned on Airbnb and incidents are rare — in 2023, just 0.035% of reservations globally resulted in a party report to the company. Airbnb is committed to reducing the risk of isolated issues and helping hosts promote positive experiences in their homes and local neighborhoods.
The system in place for this Memorial Day and Fourth of July works by identifying certain attempts to book one-night and two-night stays in entire home listings that could be higher-risk for a disruptive party and preventing those bookings from going through. The system looks at a range of factors, including the type of listing being booked, the duration of the stay, the distance to the listing from the guest’s location, and whether the booking is last minute, among many other signals, to determine whether a booking should be blocked.
As guests book reservations on Airbnb for the Memorial Day or Fourth of July weekends, the following measures are in effect across the US, including Puerto Rico:
- Restrictions on one-night and two-night bookings: Heightened restrictions on certain attempts to book entire homes where the reservation is identified as potentially higher-risk.
- Commitment to the anti-party attestation: Guests who can book local reservations will be required to attest that they understand Airbnb bans disruptive parties and that they may be subject to suspension or removal from the platform if they break this rule.
- Alternative options for guests: Guests who are prevented from booking an entire home will have the option to book a private room or hotel room on Airbnb instead, where their host is more likely to be onsite.
This heightened holiday system, which has previously been in effect for Halloween and New Year’s Eve in the US, complements Airbnb’s global reservation screening technology, which is active year-round and leverages machine learning to identify and deter higher-risk bookings in the US and globally. In the year since reservation screening launched in May 2023, over 860,000 guests worldwide have been blocked or redirected from attempting to book on Airbnb by this technology.
Collectively, these measures support efforts to enforce Airbnb’s global ban on disruptive parties. Since introducing this policy in 2020, along with these types of steps to help enforce it, Airbnb has seen an over 50 percent decrease globally in the rate of party reports.
