We all know this — gig or sharing economy is the way towards the future. It enables people to share their assets or service with other people for a certain fee. Online travel and property-rental booking services provider- Airbnb is just a product of this gig economy revolution. Today, this on-demand app enables you to book accommodations, buy travel tickets and compare electronics prices by just a few clicks from your smartphone. Investing in Airbnb clone mobile app development services is an excellent option for proper owners and travel companies to boost their business profits.
But, the major question that arises for everyone’s – how to create an app like Airbnb and how much does it cost?
Well, don’t worry. In the article below, we will provide you with a detailed idea about the Airbnb business model, its features, and the cost to develop an Airbnb clone app for both iOS and Android platform.
Let’s get started:
What is Airbnb and How Does it Work?
Airbnb is one of the most influential and fastest-growing travel and property rental booking service provider companies in the world. Basically, it operates like an online marketplace for property owners and travellers. Using this platform, travellers can rent a space or room or entire property of the actual owners for a certain period. Whereas the property owner is allowed to list their apartment or homes on the platform via their smartphone. The ease of booking travel experiences has made this service immensely popular worldwide. Here are some mind-boggling stats of on-demand mobile app development, Airbnb and its growing popularity across the world:
Airbnb Highlights
- 640,000 hosts registered on the platform.
- 7 million property listings
- 2 million guests stay at hotels per night via Airbnb.
- 10 billion miles of travel people made till now to Airbnb destinations
- 38 billion USD is estimated worth of Airbnb
Airbnb App Global Success
- 4th most downloadable app in the travel category of Play Store.
- 1.26 billion USD worth profit in 2019.
- 150 million+ global users
- 220 countries and 100,000 cities presence of Airbnb
Airbnb Business Model
Hope the above facts are good enough to convince you to create an app like Airbnb for your business. If you want to earn good profits and boost your business presence through Airbnb iOS or Android App clone, you must understand its businesses model and important features:
The entire architecture of Airbnb is based on its property owners and travellers. It works on an aggregator business model, which is also used by other popular companies like Ola and Uber, part of the sharing economy.
Using this platform, people can rent their vacant apartments to earn an extra income whereas travellers can book experience at affordable rates. Hence, it’s a “win-win” deal for both property owners and travellers.
How does Airbnb make money?
Well, Airbnb charges a commission on every booking through its platform. Around 30 lakh bookings are made every year, which is approx 2.50 lakh booking per month.
Airbnb charges commission fees from both travellers and host:
Transaction Fee From Travellers: Airbnb charges up to 6-12% commission for booking different experiences. It comes in the form of reservation fees (per room charges), cleaning fees, service fees, occupancy, extra guest fees, currency exchange charges and so on.
Commission From Property Owners: Airbnb also charges 3 to 5% fees from its host members for listing their property on its platform. Additionally, a 10% service fee is also deducted for every booking received by the host.
Why Invest Your Money in an On-demand App Like Airbnb?
As discussed above, Airbnb is a multi-billion dollar company who made profits of 4 billion USD in 2019. You can hire an expert Android or iOS app development company to develop an Airbnb clone app for your business. You can reap good profits by choosing one of the business models given below for your Airbnb clone app:
Commission: In this particular business model, your website or app will act as a mediator between property owners and travellers. You can charge a commission from both sellers and buyers, who want to rent and buy a property through your platform.
Advertising: You can charge the hotel and restaurant owners for displaying Ads on your property-rental service website or app. Every time a visitor of your website clicks on a particular ad and redirects to a third-party hotel or restaurant website, you will charge commission fees from those advertisers.
Subscription: Under this model, you can start a subscription-service for property owners and travellers where they have to pay monthly/quarterly/annually for availing services (like buying air tickets, rent a car, or even book a holiday package) via your online marketplace platform.
How to Make an App Like Airbnb?
Step 1. Map Out a Unique Business Idea or Strategy: Airbnb is not the only service on Earth that offers property-rental booking and travel services. There are other platforms like HomeAway, TripAdvisor, Tripping.com – basically, all these players do the same job – they attract customers via unique new features, free offers and intuitive booking experiences. So, its important you come up with your unique idea. Have a robust business plan to attain your goals and stay organized. Partner, a reliable app development agency to help you out.
Step 2. Partner Experienced Mobile Development Team: To create an intuitive and engaging app like Airbnb, it’s important to work with experts in the mobile app development field. Choose between in-house or outsource mobile app development service providers.
Step 3. Create a Fun, Engaging and Intuitive UI/UX Design: Remember, Airbnb has an intuitive and easy-to-use interface. Abandon rate is high for apps with unattractive design and features, so keep UI/UX design considerations in mind to deliver a seamless user experience.
Step 4. Build an MVP, Incorporate Essential Features and Receive User Feedback: The MVP version your Airbnb clone app must have basic functionalities related to accommodation- service. This will help you get feedback from users in the beta phase. You will get an idea about what users want, and accordingly, modify your app functionality.
Step 5. Test Your App: Before launch, test your app carefully: You can hire expert quality analysts to identify any bugs or errors in-app functionality and provide users with a great experience.
Step 6. Launch and Maintenance: Launch your app and perform regular maintenance activities: Besides this, provide new features and app updates to users for superior engagement.
Key Features in Airbnb Clone App
Airbnb as travel and apartment-providing service has a lot of features that need to be implemented during development. Of course, app functionality also contributes to deciding the final cost of the Airbnb clone app.
There are three types of users primarily in the Airbnb marketplace, which you need to consider for deciding your clone app features:
- Front-end User: Property Owner (Host), Travellers (Guest)
- Back-end User- Admin
Key Features for User/Guest
Signup : To start with the Airbnb platform, travellers need to sign up on the platform. Add this basic functionality to your clone app.
Login: After registration, users must log in to the app easily. Provide login options via Google account, social media platforms, etc. to users.
Search: Through this option, travellers can explore different properties, apartments or hotels available on rent.
Filter: This option enables travellers to search for properties available for rent using different search criteria like home type, amenities geolocation, etc.
Favourites: Travellers can keep the fancy accommodations in their saved places list using this option
Chats: Travellers can send or reply to a message received from property owners using this functionality.
Payments: This option provides various payment options to guests for online booking of rented spaces.
Order: Users or guests can confirm the request of renting a property by paying the initial booking amount and confirming the order.
Notifications: This option provides in-app or push notifications to travellers.
Ratings: Travelers can rate properties, based on their experiences using this option
Booking History: History of previous accommodation bookings can be seen by travellers using this option
Edit Profile: Guests can edit their profile details like name, phone, address, etc. using this option
Key Features of Host/Property Owner
Login: As travelers, the host or property owner can also login into the app using this option post-registration.
Manage Listings: This option enables the user to enter a detailed description (e.g. photos, address, bedding, etc.) of accommodations they offer on rent via the app.
See Requests: Property owners can confirm rental booking requests using the option.
Rate & Review Guests: The property owner can also rate people staying on rent in their property based on their experiences.
Booking History: Through this option, property owners can see a detailed history of all past bookings including booking stats, hosting standards, etc.
Key Features for Admin
Interactive Dashboard: Through the dashboard option, admin can get a 360-degree (graphical data) of entire bookings on the marketplace.
Manage Users: Admin has the rights like edit, update, delete, modify, etc. for platform users and different permissions given to them.
Manage Bookings: Admin can manage the entire bookings with permissions like the update, modify, delete, etc.
Manage Payment: Admin can confirm payments received on the platform users – hosts, guests, advertisers, etc.
Manage Amenities: Admin can add, update, delete amenities available under different properties listed on the platform
Reports & Analytics: Admin can get detailed insights related to bookings and transactions, carried on the Airbnb clone app – using this option.
How to Build an App Like Airbnb: Team Structure and Technology Slack
To build an app like Airbnb, you need to hire expert mobile app developers. Generally, the mobile development team, engaged in Airbnb clone app development has the following members:
- Business Analyst
- Project Manager
- UI/UX designer
- Android developers
- iOS developers
- Quality assurance engineer
- Database administrator
Airbnb Technology Stack
A lot of modern technologies can be used to build an app like Airbnb. Some of the popular programming languages that are used for Airbnb clone app development include Swift (iOS) Javascript, Kotlin (Android), etc. Partner expert Android or iOS developers to help you out in choosing the right technology stack.
Airbnb Technology Stack :
Programming Languages: Ruby, Javascript
Framework: React, Ruby on Rails
Web Server: Niginx
Cloud Storage: Amazon S3, EB3
Cloud Hosting: Amazon EC2
Cloud Database: Amazon EDS, MySQL
Big Data: Presto, Druid, Airpal
Key Factors Affecting the Cost of the Airbnb Clone App
A variety of factors affect the overall cost to create an Airbnb clone. Remember, you can also opt for the Airbnb app templates to optimize the overall cost related to Airbnb app development cost.
Development team size- If you have enough knowledge of the mobile application development process, you can work as a project manager and administer for your Airbnb clone app project. This will help you cut the size of your development team. Otherwise, you must hire members like project managers, app designers, developers and so on. Remember, this affects the final cost of your Airbnb clone app.
Location of Development Team: Generally, US-based mobile app developers charge heavy fees for building an Airbnb clone app, compared to Asian app developers. Hence, the geography of the members of your app development team is a crucial factor to decide your overall project cost.
App Developers Rates based on the location:
India: 10-80 USD
Australia: 50 to 150 USD
United States: 80 to 250 USD
Eastern Europe: 50 to 200 USD
United Kingdom: 80 to 150 USD
These rates depend on multiple factors. 3 of the most crucial ones that effect your budget are –
Platform Support- IOS, Android or both – the platform, which you choose to launch your app will also affect the final project cost. Remember, Android app development takes about 20 to 30% more time than iOS one. Keep your target audience location in mind when choosing the platform to launch your Airbnb clone app.
App Features & Complexity: Don’t forget to classify your requested app features or elements in the category of simple, medium and high complexity. The time – developers will take to implement each of these features will impact the final cost of your app.
App Design – if you want unique visual elements and tools in your Airbnb clone app -the final app price will change quite a bit also.
How Much Does it Cost to Build an App like Airbnb?[Total Cost]
The total cost to design and develop an app like Airbnb costs between 40,000 to 65,000 USD, keeping all the major user requirements in mind. If we talk more specifically, the final cost to build an app like Airbnb for Android platform would be 40,000 USD app whereas for iOS variant the price would be 65,000 USD respectively.
Note: These are approximate prices – based on features of the Airbnb clone app, given in this article. The prices can vary further – depending upon the user’s expectations regarding the app functionalities or design.
Ready To Get an App Like Airbnb?
If you are someone, who has a unique business idea and want to launch your own dream app like Airbnb, you should definitely join hands with an expert mobile app development partner like A3logics to turn your business idea into reality.
We are an award-winning IT consulting and mobile app development company who have delivered 100+ mobile app projects for some of the most reputed clients in the industry.
Drop us a line anytime to clear your doubts related to Airbnb clone app development. Get a custom quote for your project from one of our business analysts at no extra cost.
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