Aug 21, 2026
A hotel usually pays between 15% and 25% of the booking value to a booking platform. There is no single figure: it moves with the country, the size of the property and the visibility programmes the hotel signs up to. The hardest public number is further down.
The short version
- The usual industry band runs from 15% to 25% of the booking value, and the hotel pays it, not you as a separate line.
- Booking Holdings reported $26.9bn of revenues on $186.1bn of gross bookings in 2025, which is 14.5%.
- That figure blends hotels, flights and other products, so the hotel-specific commission sits above that average.
- Higher visibility programmes add a few points, and they are a choice the hotel makes rather than an obligation.
- The commission is already inside the price you see, so booking direct does not deduct it automatically, it just leaves the hotel room to move.
- Since November 2024, a European hotel has been free to publish a lower price openly on its own site.
How much does Booking.com charge a hotel?
Booking.com charges the hotel a percentage of each booking rather than a flat listing fee. In practice the starting point sits around 15% in many markets and climbs from there depending on the country, the property type and what the hotel signs up to. Each property's exact percentage lives in its contract and its extranet, not in a published rate card, which is why nobody can honestly hand you one universal number.
How much does Expedia charge?
Expedia works with a wider band than Booking.com, and independent hotels tend to land at the top of it. The logic is the same on both: a chain delivering thousands of room nights a year negotiates terms a twenty-room property never reaches. There is no published rate card here either, so any exact percentage you read without a source attached is worth treating carefully.
The number that is genuinely public
One commission figure does not rely on estimates, because the company files it with the securities regulator. In its 2025 annual report, Booking Holdings reported $26.9bn of revenues on $186.1bn of gross bookings, or 14.5%. It is the best available anchor, with one important caveat: it includes flights and other products that carry thinner margins, so what an individual hotel pays sits above that average.
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Why does it vary so much between hotels?
Commission varies between hotels because it is not a catalogue price, it is the result of several decisions. Country and season move the starting point. The size of the property decides whether there is a negotiation at all. Then there is what the hotel chooses: programmes that lift its position in results add percentage points in exchange for visibility, and using the platform's payment service adds a processing cost. Two hotels on the same street can end up paying different rates.
What does the commission have to do with what you pay?
The hotel pays the commission, but you fund it indirectly, because it is priced into the room rate. That is why a hotel's own channel sometimes has room to improve something: the rate, breakfast, or a better placed room. It is neither automatic nor required, and that is worth saying plainly, because the hotel can simply keep the whole margin. We go into it in how much you can save booking direct.
What European regulation changed
European regulation changed what a hotel is allowed to do with that margin. The European Commission designated Booking.com as a gatekeeper under the Digital Markets Act and, by the compliance date of 14 November 2024, the company had removed wide and narrow parity clauses from its agreements with European business users. Before that, those clauses limited what a hotel could publish on its own. In July 2024 the Spanish competition authority fined Booking.com 413.24 million euros for abuse of dominance, a penalty suspended by the Spanish National Court pending appeal.
When commission does not explain the price
Commission explains part of the price, but pinning everything on it leads to wrong conclusions. Do not reach for it when:
- The hotel is small and the platform brings nearly all its bookings, so it has no reason to compete with itself.
- The platform funds a promotion out of its own margin, so the price drops while the commission stays put.
- You are comparing a non refundable rate with a flexible one, where the gap is risk rather than channel.
- A tourist tax or local charge applies, since those are paid on arrival and sit outside the calculation.
- It is peak season and the hotel fills anyway, so the margin stays exactly where it is.
How to use this when you book
Knowing the commission behind a booking is mostly useful for dropping the expectation of an automatic discount and starting to check instead. Commission tells you the ceiling on the available margin, not what you will be given. Before confirming, look at the same room and the same dates on the hotel site and on the platform, signed in, and compare what each rate includes. The full comparison is in hotel website or Booking.
To skip doing that by hand every time, the Directo extension compares the hotel direct price while you browse. More than 300,000 travellers use it.
Frequently asked questions
Do I pay Booking.com's commission?
Not as a separate line on your bill. The hotel pays it on the booking value, and factors it in when setting the price it publishes. So you fund it indirectly, inside the rate, the same way you fund housekeeping and reception without seeing either itemised.
Is Expedia's commission higher than Booking.com's?
Expedia tends to work with a wider band, and independent hotels lean towards the top of it. But neither company publishes an official rate card by property type, so an exact platform to platform comparison is not possible without seeing individual contracts, which are confidential.
Can a hotel negotiate its commission?
It depends on size. A chain or a group with volume negotiates through an account manager. A small property normally receives the standard schedule for its market and has little room to move, beyond deciding whether to switch on the visibility programmes that raise the percentage.
Why does the hotel not just give me that percentage as a discount?
Because commission is a ceiling, not a discount set aside for you. The hotel uses that margin for plenty of things: covering costs, funding its own marketing, improving the result. When it does share some, it usually arrives as a member rate or included extras rather than a cut matching the whole commission.
Does rate parity still exist in Europe?
Booking.com removed wide and narrow parity clauses from its agreements with European business users by the compliance date of 14 November 2024, under the Digital Markets Act. A hotel in the European Economic Area can therefore publish a lower price openly on its own website.
Does commission make my room more expensive?
It is part of the costs the hotel covers through the price, like staff or energy. Removing it would not automatically mean a cheaper room, because the hotel would then carry the cost of finding the guest itself. What changes is where that margin sits and who decides what to do with it.
