Airbnb Wants to Feel Young Again

Booking Holdings and Airbnb have long resembled a father-son duo of the online travel industry. Airbnb has traditionally been the cool kid of the two, a fast-growing San Francisco media darling that customers flocked to. Its product became a verb. Booking—which came from an older internet generation, marked by a utilitarian, Dutch-influenced corporate culture—had to advertise heavily on Google search engines in order to attract anyone. 

But, just as people often look (and behave) more like their parents as they age, Airbnb is increasingly starting to look more like Booking. The two companies are expected to grow revenue at roughly the same rates next year—about 11%, according to FactSet. Analysts also expect they’ll end next year with about the same profit margin, 25%. Airbnb’s market cap, which in its early days as a public company had shot ahead of Booking’s in 2021, has been trailing its rival’s for the past four months.