What Is Metasearch? Hotel Price Comparison Explained

Metasearch sites such as Google, Trivago and Kayak compare hotel prices. How they work and what hotels gain from them.

By Michael Külbel 2 min read

Graphic: metasearch in four steps: search for destination and dates, compare prices from several providers, click through, book with the hotel or the platform
How metasearch works, simplified. Graphic: eingecheckt.de · Background photo: Joe Mabel, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0
Key points
  • A metasearch site compares hotel prices from several providers, such as the hotel’s website and various booking platforms. The booking is usually made not on the metasearch site itself but with the chosen provider.
  • Well-known metasearch sites include Google Hotels, Trivago, Kayak and Tripadvisor.
  • Since March 2021, hotels have been able to appear on Google with free booking links. Any hotel can take part through a Hotel Center account.
  • For its own website to appear, a hotel needs a booking engine connected to metasearch.

Metasearch is price comparison for hotels. Guests can see at a glance what a room costs from the hotel itself and from various platforms. For hotels, it is a chance to bring bookings to their own website.

What metasearch is

A metasearch site collects prices and availability from different providers for the same hotel and shows them side by side. Well-known examples are Google Hotels, Trivago, Kayak and Tripadvisor. Unlike a booking platform, a metasearch site usually does not sell rooms itself but sends guests on to the provider where the booking then takes place.

How metasearch sites make money

Traditionally, providers pay per click or per booking referred. On Google, these paid listings are called Hotel Ads. In March 2021, Google also introduced free booking links: since then, hotels and travel companies have been able to appear in price comparisons at no cost. Any hotel can take part through a Google Hotel Center account, and paid ads remain available alongside.¹

Why metasearch matters for hotels

On a metasearch site, the hotel’s website and the platforms appear directly side by side. If the hotel is not listed with its own rate, the guest almost inevitably ends up on a platform and the hotel pays commission. If its own website is listed and at least as cheap, it has a real chance of winning the direct booking.

What a hotel needs

For a hotel’s own website to appear in metasearch, rates and availability have to be supplied daily. This is usually done by the hotel’s booking engine or by a service provider that connects it to Google and other metasearch sites. Many booking engine providers offer this connection as an add-on. What matters is that rates and terms in metasearch match those on the website.

What hoteliers should look for

Checklist: becoming visible in metasearch
  1. Look at the listing: Search for the hotel on Google and check which providers appear and at what price.
  2. Clarify the connection: Ask the booking engine provider whether and how the website can be connected to Google.
  3. Use free links: Check whether the hotel already appears with free booking links.
  4. Match rates: Make sure the rate and terms in metasearch match those on the website.

More in the magazine

How guests now use AI to find hotels and why they are booking later is explained by tourism professor Marco A. Gardini in our article "AI is changing how guests find hotels and they are booking later – how hotels can adapt". What the booking path on a hotel’s own website needs to do is covered in the glossary entry on the booking engine, and why booking through the hotel’s own website matters in the entry on direct booking.

Sources

This glossary entry is based on the following source:

  1. Google (Richard Holden) (2021)
    More choice for travelers with free hotel booking links
    Blog post, 9 March 2021. Free booking links for hotels and travel companies, participation via Hotel Center.
Hotel Glossary

More terms

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Software & systems
Distribution & booking
Rates & metrics