BACKGROUND

Group travel is increasingly popular, but booking accommodations on Airbnb can be a hassle, especially when one person has to cover the full cost. A survey showed that 80% of Airbnb users go on group trips, with many organizers not getting repaid. This project aimed to improve the user experience by simplifying group bookings and removing the burden of upfront payment.

Goal

Our goal was to improve the group booking experience on Airbnb, making it easier to split costs when traveling together.

Introducing new features within Airbnb's booking process to let group travelers seamlessly split accommodation costs.

This solution simplifies trip planning, promotes fairness and transparency, and enhances the travel experience while giving Airbnb a competitive edge by addressing the needs of group travelers.

SECONDARY RESEARCH

Starting the design process with secondary research provided key insights into travel trends and user preferences for group travel and accommodation bookings.

• 79% of American travelers have been on group trips in the past five years.
• 38% have experienced not receiving all the money owed from a group trip.
• 29% have argued over money collections during group trips.

SPEAKING WITH USERS

We surveyed 20 participants (19 frequent group travelers) to understand how they manage and split accommodation costs. Most trips involve friends, family, or partners, creating a dynamic mix of expectations and expenses that can make booking stressful and cumbersome. Key findings:

Product Strategy

After brainstorming, we prioritized ideas that aligned with both business and user goals, ensuring they addressed these needs meaningfully and purposefully.

Updated flows & Sketches

We designed intuitive flows aligned with Airbnb’s interface and existing IA, focusing on simplicity and transparency for cost-sharing. By analyzing entry points, we ensured the features integrated smoothly into the existing navigation. Early ideas took shape through brainstorming, quick sketches, and crazy 8s exercises.

Integration with Airbnb’s Design System

Given Airbnb’s existing design scale, creating a new system would have been impractical. We collaborated with their established design system to seamlessly integrate new components for our proposed features.

Blending custom and existing components

But there was room for creativity! By leveraging Airbnb’s design system, we created custom components as needed.

For example, the trip card was key for the split cost feature, designed for readability and clear CTAs. We also focused on redlining to simplify the design-to-engineering process and improve our skills with Figma’s components and auto-layout features.

Our designs focused on simplifying group bookings by prioritizing the “Split Cost’' feature, allowing group members to share expenses seamlessly. To enhance the experience, we introduced two complementary features: “Friends” and “Price Filter per Guest”, improving convenience and budgeting flexibility.

Friends feature

The "Friends" feature simplifies adding friends to group trips by allowing users to select them from an accessible list.

Ideal for recurring trips, it eliminates the need to remember email addresses when setting up split-cost payments, enhancing functionality and user convenience.

Price filter per guest feature

This toggle helps users budget by displaying accommodation prices divided by guests, reducing manual calculations. It automatically calculates the per-guest cost based on group size and allows further customization during payment splitting.

Split cost feature

This feature enables splitting the cost of a group booking, ensuring each participant pays their share upfront, rather than one person covering the entire amount.

Step 1. The trip organizer chooses a listing, selects the split cost option, adds paying guests, customizes the split, pays their share, and sends payment requests to others.

Step 2. The other guests receive a notification about the split payment request and must pay their share within 24 hours to secure the group booking.

Bringing it all together

Our proposed features simplify group trip payments on Airbnb, streamlining booking and cost-sharing. By focusing on simplicity, transparency, and equity, users can easily split accommodation costs without one person covering everything upfront. This creates a seamless, budget-friendly booking experience tailored to individual financial needs.