Welcome to Booking.com! We’re committed to providing you with honest and helpful reviews to make your travel planning easier. This guide will walk you through the ins and outs of our review system, highlighting how we ensure the quality and reliability of the reviews you see.
Review Scores Explained
How are review scores calculated? Every review on Booking.com is assigned a rating on a scale of 1 to 10. To determine the overall score for an accommodation, we add up all the individual review scores and divide by the total number of reviews.
We’re currently testing a weighted review system in select countries, including Malta, Iceland, Australia, Greece, Brazil, and North Carolina. This means that more recent reviews have a greater impact on the overall score.
Subscores: Guests can also provide separate subscores for crucial areas like location, cleanliness, staff, comfort, facilities, value for money, and free Wi-Fi. It’s important to note that these subscores are submitted independently of the overall score.
Leaving and Editing Reviews
You can review an accommodation you booked through our platform, whether you stayed there or not. If you need to edit a review you’ve already submitted, please contact our Customer Service team.
Combating Fake Reviews
Booking.com takes fraud prevention seriously. We have both human reviewers and automated systems in place to detect and remove fake reviews. If we detect a fake review, we will delete it and take action against the responsible party.
We encourage users to report suspicious reviews to our Customer Service team, allowing our Fraud team to investigate further.
Review Guidelines and Standards
To ensure the integrity and relevance of our reviews, we have established specific guidelines.
What we don’t allow:
- Reviews that involve impersonation (claiming to be someone else)
- Reviews that violate our review guidelines
Review acceptance:
- We generally accept reviews submitted within 3 months of checkout.
- Reviews older than 36 months may be removed, especially if there is a change in ownership of the accommodation.
Accommodation responses:
- Accommodation providers have the option to respond to reviews.
Review Display and Sorting
When you see multiple reviews, the most recent ones will appear at the top, along with other factors such as review language, whether it includes comments, and anonymity.
You can also sort and filter reviews based on criteria such as time of year, review score, and type of traveller.
External Reviews
We sometimes display external review scores from other reputable travel websites. We always make it clear when we’re doing so.
Content Guidelines
Our review guidelines aim to:
- Maintain relevant and family-friendly content without stifling the expression of strong opinions.
- Apply equally to positive and negative comments.
Key review guidelines:
- Contributions should be travel-related: Focus on the accommodation and your travel experience. Avoid personal, political, ethical, or religious commentary.
- Be appropriate for a global audience: Refrain from profanity, hate speech, discriminatory remarks, threats, sexually explicit content, violence, and promotion of illegal activities.
- Reviews should be genuine and unique: Write your own honest opinion. Do not post on behalf of guests, offer incentives, or try to negatively impact a competitor.
- Respect the privacy of others: We take steps to obscure personal information like email addresses, phone numbers, and social media handles.
Disclaimer
The opinions expressed in reviews are those of the Booking.com customers and properties, not of Booking.com. We are not responsible for the content of reviews or responses.
Review Sorting and Translations
Reviews are sorted by default based on review date and other criteria, such as language, reviews with text, and non-anonymous reviews. You can choose from additional sorting options.
This service may include translations powered by Google. Google disclaims any warranties related to the translations, express or implied.
