How to rank higher on Booking.com

Booking.com's guide for properties names four groups of things:

• The property: its location, its prices on Booking.com, its guest review score and how good its page is.
• How it does on Booking.com: how often travellers click from the results to its page, and how often a visit to its page ends in a booking.
• The traveller's search: the place, the dates, the length of stay and the guests.
• The traveller: Booking.com orders the results for each one.

Booking.com also tells travellers that the commission a property pays, how quickly it pays, and whether it is in Genius or the Preferred Partner Programme can affect the order. A thumbs-up marks a Preferred partner, and an Ad label a property that paid for its place. In countries where a hotel has no duty to match its prices elsewhere, which include every country in the European Economic Area, Booking.com says it doesn't look at your prices on other sites when it ranks you.

• Your price on Booking.com against similar properties nearby, for the same dates.
• Rooms open on more nights. A property with nothing to sell for the dates searched isn't shown for them.
• Your page: every part filled in, recent photos of every room, the right facilities and your policies.
• Your review score. Since January 2025 Booking.com weights it by how recent each review is, so the newest reviews count most.
• A flexible rate beside the non-refundable one, so travellers who want free cancellation find you.

Booking.com shows the things behind your place, and how travellers move from its results to your page to a booking, in the extranet under Analytics, in “Your search ranking and booking performance”.

Booking.com names five programmes that raise your place: Genius, Deals, the Preferred Partner Programme, Preferred Plus and the Visibility Booster. It also sells Sponsored Listings, adverts paid for by the click and marked Ad.

These are Booking.com's own averages. Try a programme on a few months of your own dates and compare the bookings with what the extra commission or discount cost you.

1. 1Open Booking.com in a private window, signed out, so that your own searches don't change what you see.
2. 2Search your town for one night two weeks away, and for a weekend a month away, with two adults and one room.
3. 3Leave the order on Booking.com's own default and note where your hotel comes.
4. 4Do the same in the Booking.com app on a phone.
5. 5Note the properties above you: their price for the same night, their review score and how many reviews they have.
6. 6Repeat each week on the same dates, so that you compare like with like.

Booking.com orders results for each traveller, so what you see is one traveller's list, not a fixed place. Doing the same search the same way each week still shows which way you are moving.

How often travellers click through to your page and book is itself among what decides your place, so a page that turns visits into bookings moves you up as well.

• Put the photo that sells the room first: the bed, the view, the bathroom, in daylight.
• Write the description for the questions guests ask: how far to the station or the beach, parking, breakfast, check-in.
• Answer your reviews, low scores first: travellers read the replies too.