Airbnb and Its Competitors in Georgia: Who Dominates the Short-Term Rental Market?

Over the past decade, Georgia has emerged as one of the South Caucasus’s prime tourist destinations, and platformized tourism has transformed how accommodation is supplied and consumed. In 2024 the country welcomed about 5.4 million visitors, of which 5.1 million were tourist-type arrivals (Geostat, 2025). The majority of these trips were concentrated in Tbilisi and Adjara, especially Batumi. Demand has been further fuelled by the 2022–2023 influx of Russian, Ukrainian, and Belarusian migrants, which put pressure on housing supply and drove many owners to list their properties on short-term rental (STR) platforms.

At the center of this ecosystem stands Airbnb, but it is far from unchallenged. Competing platforms include Booking.com, Vrbo/Expedia Group, Trip.com/Agoda, Yandex Travel and Ostrovok, Hostelworld, metasearch sites such as HomeToGo and Tripadvisor/FlipKey, as well as the dominant local classifieds market on MyHome.ge. Each serves a distinct audience and contributes to a complex competitive landscape.

Airbnb’s Position: Scale and Brand Power

Airbnb remains the most visible and widely used STR platform in Georgia. According to Airbtics snapshots from mid-2025, Batumi had around 3,307 active listings with an average daily rate (ADR) of about US$37 and an annual revenue potential of roughly US$7,000 per unit. In Tbilisi, the active inventory ranged between 6,000 and 7,000 units, with ADRs of US$39–53 and estimated revenues between US$5,600–8,000 per unit.

Airbnb is particularly dominant in studio and one-bedroom apartments, which proliferate in Tbilisi’s new high-rises and Batumi’s seaside towers. Its global brand recognition, combined with a trusted review system, makes it the default first stop for Western and EU visitors.

Another key advantage is AirCover, Airbnb’s built-in host protection program, offering up to US$3 million in damage protection and US$1 million in liability coverage. For individual owners without private insurance, this feature is highly attractive. The platform also streamlines payments in lari, dollars, and euros, handles cancellations and refunds, and provides basic safeguards for both hosts and guests.

Yet Airbnb’s weaknesses in Georgia are pronounced. Seasonality is the most severe challenge: in Batumi, more than 80% of annual revenue is generated in July–August, while winter occupancy collapses into the low double digits. Quality consistency is another issue. Guest complaints about cleanliness, maintenance, noise, and misleading descriptions are common compared to professionally managed hotels. Finally, Airbnb’s platform is designed around Western languages and payment systems, leaving gaps for Russian-speaking travelers, who often prefer Yandex Travel or Ostrovok for easier service.

Booking.com: Hotels First, but Homes Too

Airbnb’s strongest rival in Georgia is Booking.com, which dominates the hotel sector but has also built a vast global portfolio of 6.6 million+ homes and apartments. In Georgia, Booking.com lists thousands of hotels and aparthotels in Tbilisi and Batumi, often cross-listing entire blocks such as Batumi’s Orbi towers.

For travelers, Booking.com offers the reassurance of 24/7 customer service, loyalty programs, and flexible cancellation policies. For hosts, the platform provides convenient payout systems, including virtual cards, useful for Georgian owners without merchant accounts.

The downsides are clear: Booking charges higher commissions (15–20%) than Airbnb and remains more hotel-centric in its interface design, which can be less intuitive for small-scale apartment owners. Moreover, for Russian travelers, international card sanctions make Booking less convenient compared to CIS-oriented alternatives.

Vrbo and Expedia: Niche but Valuable

Vrbo, part of the Expedia Group, emphasizes entire-home rentals and family/group travel. Its Tbilisi category alone shows more than 1,100 properties, with additional coverage in Batumi. Vrbo attracts higher-spending, longer-stay travelers, often from North America and Western Europe. However, the platform’s brand recognition in Georgia is limited, and its service fees can deter budget-minded visitors.

Meanwhile, Expedia/Hotels.com remain influential in the corporate and conference travel segment. Their hotel focus provides resilience during off-season months when Airbnb hosts struggle with low occupancy. Professional property managers often multi-list apartments across Expedia, Booking, and Airbnb, particularly in large developments.

Asian and CIS Platforms: New Geographies of Demand

A significant shift in Georgia’s tourism market is the rise of Asian and Middle-Eastern visitors, supported by new direct flight routes. Platforms like Trip.com and Agoda are well positioned to capture this growth. They integrate Chinese payment systems, offer aggressive price-match guarantees, and have strong mobile penetration. Still, their brand recognition among Georgian property owners remains weak, with much of the inventory coming via global wholesalers rather than direct contracts.

By contrast, Yandex Travel and Ostrovok.ru serve the CIS traveler base. They list thousands of properties in Georgia—Ostrovok alone shows 19,000+ nationwide, including 4,126 in Batumi—and allow payment in roubles. For Russian, Belarusian, and Armenian tourists, these platforms provide familiarity and convenience. Yet their reliance on Russian payment infrastructure makes them inaccessible to many Western travelers, and our research even encountered geofenced access errors (403) when trying to open Yandex Travel pages from the U.S.

Niche Players: Hostelworld, Metasearch, and the Local Shadow Market

Hostelworld addresses a very different segment—backpackers and digital nomads seeking €3–10 dorm beds in central Tbilisi. While marginal in scale, it represents a slice of demand not captured by Airbnb or Booking.

Metasearch engines like HomeToGo and Tripadvisor/FlipKey aggregate listings from other OTAs, shaping pricing transparency and pushing property managers to adopt cross-listing strategies. They don’t manage inventory directly but can influence consumer decision-making.

Finally, Georgia’s MyHome.ge plays a pivotal role as a shadow STR market. Its “ქირავდება დღიურად” (daily rent) filter lists thousands of properties, many transacted in cash to avoid fees or taxes. Travelers from Russia and Armenia often use MyHome alongside Airbnb, choosing whichever option appears cheaper. While MyHome offers flexibility, it lacks reviews, payment security, and dispute resolution—posing risks to both guests and hosts.

Social and Economic Impacts

The expansion of STR platforms has had profound social effects in Georgia’s urban centers. In Tbilisi and Batumi, rents have risen sharply, pricing out many local residents—especially young families and students. Apartments once available for long-term tenants are now listed on Airbnb or Booking, chasing higher yields.

This shift has also reshaped the hotel sector. Traditional hotels now face intense competition during peak summer months, though they retain an advantage in winter due to corporate bookings and conference tourism. Some hotels have responded by cross-listing rooms on Booking and even Airbnb.

For local governments, the boom in STRs presents fiscal and regulatory challenges. While hosts can register and pay a flat 5% tax on rental income, enforcement is weak, and many cash rentals go undeclared. As a result, municipalities lack reliable data on the true scale of STR activity.

Policy and Regulation: An Unfinished Agenda

Georgia’s light-touch framework has so far favored rapid STR growth. But international trends suggest tighter regulation is coming. In 2024, the EU mandated STR platforms to share anonymized booking data with local authorities. If Georgia were to adopt similar measures, cities like Tbilisi and Batumi could better track neighborhood pressures, enforce safety standards, and ensure tax compliance.

Discussions are already underway about requiring fire-safety certificates and minimum insurance coverage for hosts, particularly after several high-rise fires in Batumi. Such rules would likely benefit professional managers and hotels, while squeezing out informal operators.

Strategic Outlook: A Multi-Platform Future

Airbnb will remain pivotal in Georgia’s STR market, but its dominance is no longer absolute. The competitive environment is diversifying along geographic, linguistic, and price lines. Booking is the natural choice for hotels and a growing force in apartments; Yandex/Ostrovok serve CIS travelers; Trip.com/Agoda target Asia and the Gulf; Vrbo appeals to premium Western families; and MyHome.ge anchors the informal, cash-based local segment.

For hosts, the lesson is clear: multi-platform listing is essential. Property managers who cross-list across Airbnb, Booking, Yandex, and metasearch portals can boost off-season occupancy by 5–10 percentage points. Professionalization—better cleaning, guest services, and compliance—also helps reduce the risks of seasonality and strengthens pricing power.

For policymakers, the challenge lies in balancing tourism growth with housing affordability and safety. Without greater visibility into STR activity, cities risk undermining the very communities that sustain tourism.

Airbnb revolutionized Georgia’s rental market, but it no longer defines it alone. The country’s STR ecosystem is now a multi-platform marketplace, where competition shapes not only technology choices but also social, economic, and political outcomes.