From terrible to completely ridiculous.

[Robin4]

Having just read the 'Summer Release' update link I thought I would check out how much feedback had been taken on board from the first month of the changes to search criteria.  I wish I hadn't....searching for a listing is now complete chaos!

When I bring up a search page now, this morning 12/06/2022 I can't even search my country of Australia any more, let alone a specific area.

Here are my search options..........

The only search box I am faced with is 'Where',  and clicking that brings up 6 general region boxes.

and clicking on the area boxes does absolutely nothing but at least now brings up a destination option. But it took me a while to find that option....guests are going to find this hard to tolerate, particularly those who have used the booking process before.

My bookings have fallen away to zero over the past few weeks and I can't see that there will be any improvement until we get back to the situation where a guest could simply search an area, availability, nightly price without having to jump through all these hoops.

Cheers........Rob

[Fred13]

We are the 2nd island shown in that strip (behind the Search by Region window) and I must say even with such a favorable position our bookings have been very jittery for 3 months.  There seems like there is a lot of hesitation on the part of people to book, especially well into the future, something we have never seen in 7 years. Once-again abrupt changes will happen with this upcoming mid-term U.S. November election and people may be sensing it and becoming subconsciously non-committal, until after. 

Airbnb's new recent search feature is of course a whole added subject.

[Gillian19]

@Robin4  it seems to be a bit easier to search on the app, but still so much harder to find accommodation where you want. One of my properties doesn't come up when I select the beach category. It mentions beach several times. Other properties that are further from the beach come up. So now I have to try and work it out. The mysteries of Airbnb!!

[Wende2]

@Gillian19...Have you seen on the newer post about this problem, you can call CS and request a category.  That's my plan now, I'm the closest to a huge wildlife refuge and the Harriet Tubman Museum, both are considered National parks. 

Best wishes that your bookings somehow pick up, seems there's  A LOT of us in the same boat now.

[Lynell0]

@Robin4  You are right, the new 'Summer Release' is terrible.  I  have had no bookings since the release, as have a lot of other hosts.   I can only assume that Airbnb is to hard or to time consuming to navigate.

 @Airbnb  Keep it simple, please!!  If it's not broken, don't fix it.   There is plenty of other things that need fixing, like the review system or better trained CS staff.  All that the guests really need is area, availability, and nightly price.  If they want beach front, then maybe that could be in a filter that they can select.  And Hosts with a beach front can select in their listing that it is  a beach front. No need for the AI to tell us.  

At the end of the day, we all want the same things.  Bookings and happy guests.  With these two things you will have happy hosts.  

[Gabrielle273]

@Lynell0 My husband made the wry observation that ReCaptcha uses images to confuse AI...why would we WANT AI trying to decipher our images anyway??

I think it's terrible that this is affecting seasonal hosts.  I host year-round, so I've taken a hit, and now I know why.  I hope we can hang on finacially while we pivot our homes to other platforms and our own Direct Booking website.

What Airbnb SWOT analysis suggested an untested rollout in May?  What poor timing.  Any executive team knows better than to rollout mid year.  If hosts are losing revenue, then Airbnb must be as well.  It's a lose-lose-lose situation.  Just restore the "default" settings, or Airbnb may become the name of a product, without a product.  "Are you staying at an Airbnb on your trip?"  "We are, but Airbnb isn't working, so we've switched to...."  May it not be!

[Heather1086]

am glad I’m not alone! I thought it was just me. Prior to the new release I was getting a lot of reservations which is typical… after the release I have had zero! I am a superhost and also have the badge for rare find. I did a search this morning with the new search engine for a week in Sept (have zero bookings) and it didn’t come up… not even on the map! I’m at a loss of what to do as I watch my potential booking income tank.

[Don-And-Emily0]

Our property doesn’t even appear in a search for 4th of July weekend, one of the biggest travel weekends after Thanksgiving. Not sure why @Airbnb keeps us a secret. So much for “improvements” 

[Nancy1633]

And my Margaretville, NY log cabin (Western Catskills)  disappeared off the map when I clicked the "cabin" category- which zoomed the map out to G-d knows where.  My bookings dropped like a rock after the 2022 Summer Release.  

[Deb75]

Same here.  My tiny cabin was ALWAYS booked 3-4 months ahead. UNTIL the day after the roll out. AND the day after, my views went from over 200 a day, to less than 20...OVERNIGHT...because my listing could no longer be found..

Thankfully most of my summer was booked prior to the roll out. Then....nothing...so half of August is empty. September, October , and.....fall foliage season....nothing...I am in the Cumberland Mountains of Tennessee. Campgrounds are full, all the park trailheads are full.  AND....my listing has disappeared. ONLY was it can be found is if the 'guest' goes to my 'area' (a small town in the mountains, or a nearby one) searching from Google "cabin with a view Altamont, Tn Airbnb"  then a generic page comes up and I am not on that page, or the subsesquent 15 pages, and by the 2nd or 3rd page they are shown properties miles and hours away from their target area!!

  However, IF you choose dates that I happen to have available, I usually come up on the first page. However, in the past, a guest could 'browse' my area for a cabin, filter to size , price, etc and I always came up first page. Superhost, over 200 15 star reviews, etc etc. They could find me, and THEN check what dates I might have. A lot of them, without a specific event to come here for, just want to see what is out there and when the they find something they like, to check when the  property is available. Especially for summer and fall foliage.  No more.  So now if they are looking for a great spot for fall foliage, and don't have specific dates in my, I do not appear in any search because of their 'flexibility'. AND because I am currently booked for the next 5 weeks.  I have heard that Airbnb is pushing (and they do make these 'suggestions' on my page) for LONG term stays.  NO!  first of all, MANY of us have unusual properties that are not suited for that! Tents, yurts, houseboats, tiny cabins, and so on and so on.. No clue how any huge company could 'accidently' roll out something so inane, complicated for both guest and host.  There MUST be another reason..Sometimes they (and the 'tycoon owners' with large numbers of properties' ) seem to think that ALL of us have condos, single family homes and have no interest in supporting the rest of us who do not. And all of the 'glitches'...I'm still fighting the bizarre prices they are putting on my listing when viewed in certain ways.  I'm at $105/night and on my preview home page it shows $144.  On certain ways a guest may find it on the app, it shows $143, but if you click ON the listing (why would you, if it's out of your price range) it shows the correct price where you can book it...Huh???  They cannot seem to fix this either...

It's very very strange.  

[Heather1086]

@Don-And-Emily0  Same! I have 4th of July open as well... which never happens. My house is located in a vacation resort area in Central Oregon and is very popular for summer vacations. This isn't just gas prices are high.

[Stephanie1933]

@Heather1086 I have had zero bookings too! Only on other platforms. One day my views was as low as 1! In previous days I was getting up to 80 views a day. So frustrating. I wish there was an option for guests to search 'House' or 'Family Friendly' or  'Vacation house'. Our house is just a lovely modern house. Not these crazy other options which are fab, but not the norm. So disappointing. I have no idea how to fix it. 

[Vivienne36]

I had this for months in west London. But now I have had the best year ever  I wonder if it’s out too any air b & b in a specific area so some don’t show up. But she that area gets busy they all turn up. Who knows  

[JJ48]

@Robin4  The Destination box is the same as before. It says "Where" and then "Search Destinations".  Just type in the name of your destination as you've done in the past. 

Search by Region is an additional option, just like all of the other new options, but the box where your type in the name of your destination is the same. So if you have a specific destination you should just use the search destination box and ignore the regions option.  Incidentally, I think we all see different regions in the regions option. I notice that the regions I am shown are all places that are outside of my own country, but places that I've searched for listings in before. 

I'm sorry to hear that your bookings have decreased, but isn't it possible that your bookings may have "fallen away to zero over the past few weeks" because Australia has had some of the highest rates of covid in the world? They started reporting that in the news in the US and the UK right about the same time as the update came out.  And Australia is still (and one of the very few) countries that is a terribly unfavorable shade of dark purple (the darkest on the scale) on the NY Times Hot spots map.  

I mention it because my little state here has a habit of routinely popping into the number one spot in the US and I can see on my stats graph that both my bookings and my views dip down during those times when we have an exceptionally high covid rate. 

But either way, I hope it all clears up for you soon. Best. 

[Nancy1633]

@JJ48 

@Robin4  is not alone. Hosts are reporting here that their listings are not showing on search results, among other consequences of the 2022 Summer Release.  If listings don't appear on the map, they don't get booked.  Which is what is happening to many many hosts (including me), driving them to other venues, like VRBO.  

The platform was completely changed in numerous ways that are making listings unfindable (not shown on AirBnb map, or whole regions not mapped) and booking confusing, with default future weeks being offered, suggesting those are the first availability.  There is a 51 page thread on the topic that AirBnb buried. Find it.  You'll get a better picture that this is a systemic issue. 

As for COVID-19, I started my upstate NY biz at the height of Delta, then came Omicron. I was getting booked every weekend. With Spring ahead, my bookings picked up then BOOM- nothing after the platform change.