City With the Highest Rated Airbnb’s Revealed in Travel Study!

Airbnb recently reported bookings shooting up 52% as Covid restrictions have begun easing in countries across the world.

Holidaymakers are jet setting after over a year of restricted travel and have inspired the experts at money.co.uk to investigate which location around the world has the highest rated Airbnb’s.

Money.co.uk utilised Forbes’ bucket list of the top 50 places in the world to visit (based on a survey of 1.5million people) and searched each destination on Airbnb and the review score to create an overall average. Money.co.uk used the Bayesian average rating calculation, which considers both the average rating and the number of reviews, to produce an evenly distributed score.

The top 10 highest rated locations for Airbnb bookings

Located in the upper North Island of New Zealand, Waikato ranks as the best-rated travel destination with a travel popularity rating score of 100/100. With tons of things to see and do in Waikato, it is widely known for containing the longest river in NZ, the Waikato River, and its largest lake, Lake Taupō.

In second place with a popularity ranking of 98/100 is Beijing, China. China’s cultural and political centre for more than 700 years, Beijing is stocked full of history and architecture covering key parts of the great nation’s past.

Taking the third spot is the southwest region of Ireland, Kerry, with an average rating of 96/100. Alongside its green land and mountains, Kerry is home to breath-taking cliffs, coastlines, and famous landmarks such as Torc Waterfall and Torc Mountain.

Making the top 25 locations

James Andrews, personal finance expert at money.co.uk said:

“With summer holidays here and travel on the increase, it’s tempting to consider earning some extra cash by letting out your home as a short-term rental. However, it’s important to see how this could impact your home insurance.

“Although Airbnb states hosts are eligible for property damage protection, homeowners are encouraged to get personal insurance too. That’s because the policy doesn’t cover a whole raft of things that a standard home insurance policy will.

“More, unless you’ve told your insurance provider, your entire claim could be rejected if you’re broken into or suffer other problems – including fire, flood or storm damage – while renting out your home.

“The good news is that many policies will let you add Airbnb or similar cover to them, to offer peace of mind while guests enjoy your home.

“To find out the steps and precautions to take when renting out your property, please see our how to rent out your house guide.”

Methodology 

1. Money.co.uk conducted research to identify the location with the highest-rated Airbnb services to help travellers choose their next holiday destinations.
2. Money.co.uk used Forbes’ bucket list of the top 50 places in the world to visit based on a survey of an audience of 1.5million.
3. Secondly, information such as user ratings, person capacity, and the number of reviews for Airbnb’s per holiday destination was collected from Airbnb.
4. Following the data collection phase, the sample was aggregated by holiday destination to calculate the weighted average rating, total number of reviews, and average person capacity per destination.
5. Finally, Money.co.uk calculated a Bayesian average rating for each destination which considered the weighted average rating as well as the number of reviews per destination to provide a comprehensive global rating. The Bayesian average was then normalised to produce a more evenly distributed ranking score that highlights ranking discrepancies.

* All data was collected on 26/07/2021.

** Although Barbados is a country, Forbes listed it as a top travel location, so it was analysed in this way.

*** Paro Valley (Bhutan), Petra (Jordan), Laucala Island Resort (Fiji), Virunga National Park (Democratic Republic of Congo) were excluded from the list due to Airbnb showing no results.