Airbnb starts giving Airbnb.org 10 cents per stay as the charity aims for 1 million free nights a year

Airbnb has started donating part of its revenue from every stay booked on its platform to Airbnb.org, the nonprofit it founded in 2020 to give people free temporary housing in a crisis. Under the funding model announced on October 28, 2026, the company gives $0.10 for each stay. It says the arrangement will help provide $500 million to Airbnb.org over the next five years and put the charity on a path to providing 1 million nights of free housing a year.

Guests do not pay more and hosts' payouts do not change, Airbnb says, and neither has to opt in. According to the Airbnb.org page that explains the model, the donation is made only for completed stays, not for stays canceled before check-in or for bookings of experiences and services. A California notice on the same page says Airbnb makes the per-stay contributions quarterly. The page also says that no part of a guest's payment is tax deductible as a charitable contribution, and that Airbnb or Airbnb.org may change or end the model at any time.

How far 10 cents a stay goes

Neither the announcement nor the Airbnb.org page says how much of the $500 million the per-stay donation itself is expected to raise. Airbnb's annual report for 2025 gives a sense of scale. The platform recorded 533 million nights and seats booked that year, a figure that also counts seats for experiences and services, and the average booking, excluding experiences and services, lasted 3.7 nights. That implies fewer than 150 million stays. At 10 cents each, the donation would come to less than $15 million a year, or roughly $70 million over five years at 2025 levels. These are our estimates, and growth in bookings would raise them.

Airbnb.org's page describes the $500 million as a combined figure: per-stay donations plus "additional support from Airbnb and other donors." Airbnb already covers all of Airbnb.org's operating costs, so that public donations go entirely to housing, and it makes no money from Airbnb.org stays, the announcement says.

What the money will pay for

Airbnb.org is moving beyond disaster response. By the end of 2026 it expects to support families traveling for medical care in more than 20 countries, with partners that include Children's Miracle Network in the United States and the Leukaemia Foundation of Australia. A new program will give free, temporary stays to survivors of domestic violence and exploitation, with partners including Peace House in Utah. Support for U.S. veterans facing serious illness or intensive treatment is expanding with Fisher House Foundation, Dream Foundation and Operation Healing Forces.

Airbnb.org relies on local nonprofits and government partners to find the people it helps, then gives them credits to book an Airbnb home. The guests pay nothing, while Airbnb.org pays the hosts for the stay. Hosts can also give discounts on stays or donate a share of their Airbnb earnings.

Now, every time someone books a home on Airbnb, they'll help someone else find a place to stay when they need it most.

A company-founded charity

Airbnb.org, Inc. is a registered 501(c)(3) nonprofit based in San Francisco. Its page describes it as "a separate and independent organization from Airbnb, Inc. and its affiliates," although Airbnb funds its running costs and, under the new model, ties part of its income to Airbnb's booking volume. Airbnb reported revenue of $12.2 billion for 2025, up 10% from a year earlier, and net income of $2.5 billion.

Airbnb traces the idea to 2012, when one host took in people displaced by Hurricane Sandy. Airbnb.org's next goal is a big step up: the 1 million free nights it wants to provide each year by 2030 compare with more than 1.6 million provided in total since 2020. Our explainer on corporate giving sets out the tax rules for company donations.