Airbnb bars hosts from making guests wash dishes or strip beds for bookings from 20 November

What changes for guests

Airbnb has rewritten the house rules that hosts can set, restricting the chores they may hand to guests at checkout. The changes apply to all bookings made on the platform from 20 November. Hosts may no longer require tasks that take considerable effort or time, or that a professional cleaner would normally handle, such as stripping beds, running the washing machine, taking out the rubbish, or washing and putting away dishes. Small requests remain allowed, such as leaving used dishes in the sink or collecting used towels. Hosts also cannot restrict access to amenities listed in the advert, such as air conditioning, or impose fines of their own.

Why Airbnb is changing the rules

Airbnb says the decision responds to guest complaints about extra duties at checkout. The company described house rules as the tool guests use to learn what hosts expect, and said users had reported that those rules often confuse, burden and are hard to handle. Airbnb also said the rules would be easier to find and clearer to set. The company frames the new policy around requests that stay reasonable, with no surprises for guests.

House rules help guests understand what hosts expect, but we've heard from our community that they can be confusing, onerous and hard to manage.

Seven standard rules and enforcement

Hosts must now pick from seven standard house rules rather than writing their own. The options include the maximum number of guests, quiet hours, pets, smoking, events and photo shoots, and whether the property must be locked on departure. Hosts can still add extra requests, but they must be reasonable, and Airbnb says it will consider the property type and local context and may grant exceptions. Rules must be displayed prominently on the listing page, and hosts may not add new requirements after a booking through messages, signs in the home or conversations. Requests that break the policy will be flagged in the listing editing tool, and hosts risk a warning or lower visibility in search results. Separate contracts are limited to cases such as legal requirements or homeowners' association rules, and hosts whose requests are flagged may appeal.

Owners push back, guests welcome the change

Reactions are divided. In Italy, the ABBAC, a national network of non-hotel accommodation providers, voiced strong concern about what it called unilateral choices that risk penalising managers and owners. The association said it does not dispute the need to protect consumers, but considers it unacceptable for an international platform to change such important terms without consulting sector representatives first. A Change.org petition asking Airbnb to reverse the decision had more than 5,000 signatures when the Xataka article was written. On Reddit, some hosts welcomed the clarity, while others raised cleanliness concerns, including ant infestations caused by unclean guests. Guests largely welcomed the change, arguing they should not pay a cleaning fee and then clean anyway.

Cleaning fees in the background

Guests usually pay a cleaning fee when booking, and Xataka reports that this charge can in some cases exceed hundreds of euros. Fanpage notes that since April 2025 the platform has included cleaning costs in the price shown to guests. The Washington Post reports that guests have complained for years about hidden fees and checkout chores. Nick Ewen, editor in chief at The Points Guy, described the kind of surprise charge that worries travellers.

They can't say they're providing air-conditioning, but if the guest uses it too much, they're going tack on a $20 fee

The new limits take effect for reservations made on or after 20 November, and the platform will flag requests that do not comply.