Many of us mark vacations on our calendars and use them as motivation to grind through our daily routines. Still, the process of actually booking travel is daunting. We compare Booking vs. Expedia in detail to share our personal experience and highlight the pros and cons of each platform.
Vacations and holidays are too important for our mental health to fret over which online travel agency you should use. So, let’s dive deep so that you can focus on that vacation breeze blowing through your hair.
Which is Better? Booking vs. Expedia
Booking and Expedia are two juggernauts in the world of online travel, and deciding which is better will likely come down to preference. For those that travel frequently, you will reap the most travel rewards when you stick to the same platform.
And that might be a good place to start in deciding which way to go. I personally prefer the Booking platform and rewards program, so that’s my recommendation.
Even so, there are reasons to try both platforms before settling on one, and we will explore those reasons below.
Analyzing Price and Value: Does Booking or Expedia Win?
In comparing Booking vs. Expedia, the first inclination might be to ask which is cheaper. This will vary for each potential trip, but there are some trends and nuances worth considering. Still, in my experience, Booking.com is a little cheaper than Expedia.com, but this isn’t always true.
I will also say that any savings are usually minor when comparing the two brands.
Booking.com Price and Value
While the reality is that most online travel agencies offer very similar pricing, that’s not always the case. In my experience, there are times when Booking.com offers a noticeable discount compared to the other major OTAs, even if it’s not much.
Plus, joining Booking’s loyalty rewards program will provide you with access to even more discounts. If you do much traveling, I recommend you consider signing up. On day 1, you will access 10% discounts at more than 350,000 participating properties, and the benefits get better from there. Just sign up and look for the blue Genius logo.
After several qualifying stays, you will gain access to Genius Level 2, which offers 15% discounts. You will also gain access to complimentary breakfast and free upgrades as part of the Level 2 rewards program. For those that travel enough to reach Genius Level 3, you will eventually unlock 20% discounts and priority support!
Some rewards programs exist to collect your personal information, but Booking.com’s loyalty program provides real, tangible benefits to its members.
Beyond the rewards program, the biggest value and price advantages occur when you utilize Booking.com to bundle your travel.
Expedia Price and Value
The biggest value of using Expedia is the brand’s extensive network. There are millions of options, and in my opinion, that defines value. You can find the cheapest accommodations possible or the most luxurious 5-star hotel. However you define price and value, Expedia is there to deliver.
Still, it is also worth highlighting that there are two primary ways to save money: bundling and the rewards program. Expedia emphasizes bundling more than some of its competitors, and for a good reason. It’s a win-win scenario.
Sure, when you bundle some combination of a flight, hotel, and car rental, Expedia likely makes more money. At the same time, if you plan to book for all three needs anyway, you might as well save some money yourself. Based on my family’s travel experiences and booking experiments, bundling often saves hundreds of dollars.
You can also save money by joining the Expedia rewards program, now known as One Key. As you earn rewards with One Key, you are eligible to use OneKeyCash across the entire Expedia platform. So, you can earn points through Expedia and spend them at Hotels.com or Vrbo.
Notably, One Key members save up to 10% on hotels and up to 30% when bundling a hotel with a flight. Discounts and rewards only go up from there.
Comparing Services and Features
You will find many of the same services and features when you compare Booking vs. Expedia, but the two online travel agencies are also very different. Both brands have stellar mobile apps, which you can easily navigate to track your most important travel information.
One interesting note is that the Expedia and Booking apps are listed as #4 and #5, respectively, for travel apps in Apple’s App Store.
Booking.com Services and Features
One thing that I love about Booking.com is that they offer options well beyond the traditional hotel. This really helps them stand apart. You can find hotels, yes, but you can also find rentals, including big city apartments, beachside villas, condo hotels, cottages, vacation homes, and more.
There are very few sites that offer a similar breadth of options.
And we also love the different ways you can search for potential destinations. Booking.com serves as a booking service, but they are much more. If you are looking for inspiration, they will help you find that, too.
For instance, they have ‘unique places to stay’ grouped into fun categories, including glamping sites, tiny houses, romantic hotels, ski resorts, and more.
You’ll find local attractions, too, which you can book as part of your overall bundle.
Booking offers a variety of niche services designed to meet any travel need or preference. For extended trips on which you plan to stay 30 nights or more, Booking will help you locate discounted rates. After all, in an era of work-from-home and nomadic lifestyles, the old rules don’t apply.
While joining the Genius Loyalty Program will result in big discounts, remember that you will also gain access to other loyalty program features. For instance, at Level 2, you will unlock free breakfast and room upgrades, and at Level 3, you will unlock prioritized customer service.
Booking Mobile App Experience
Booking.com’s app offers a clean interface, is easy to use, and offers access to nearly all of the same services and features that are available on the full web version of the site. While some travel sites have apps that feel like an afterthought built during the stone age of mobile applications, Booking.com’s app is modern and intuitive to use.
While that might seem like generic platitudes, I assure you that the app is top-notch. Quite frankly, the Booking.com app is a world-leading app in the online travel services space, and you don’t have to take my word for it. With more than 800,000 reviews, the Booking mobile app is rated at 4.8 stars.
You can book your entire trip from the app, including local attractions. Plus, Booking offers app-exclusive deals, so it makes sense to check it out. The mobile app also makes it easy to manage your trip from the palm of your hand. For instance, most partner sites offer free cancellations, which you can conveniently take care of wherever you want, and whenever you want to do so.
Expedia Services and Features
Expedia lists hotels with special discounts at the top of their listing, and it’s easy to see important information before you ever click on a hotel option. You can also see which hotels participate in the ‘Reserve Now, Pay Later’ program, which essentially allows you to book the hotel and pay at the hotel.
You can search by your desired location, or for a little inspiration; you can review hotels in the top destination cities. Expedia’s simply designed layout is fantastic for helping you identify exactly what you want, even before you know what that is. Interested in VIP access? You can search for that, too.
The Expedia.com user interface is straightforward and easy to use. In fact, if there is one knock that we have on the Expedia user interface is that it is so simple it is almost boring. The platform also leaves some features on the table.
Based on my experience, my favorite part of the Expedia.com layout is that search options and filters are available but not busy. You can easily filter by your favorite hotel brand or by certain amenities. You can also expand a map so that you can choose a hotel convenient to your end destination.
Most travel booking sites have these features, but the beauty here is how simply these options are baked into the interface and experience.
Expedia Mobile App Experience
The mobile app experience very much reflects the overall online experience. Still, the Expedia app interface is more streamlined than the overall web experience. But there is one distinct Expedia app feature worth mentioning.
Expedia quickly integrated a ChatGPT-like feature that will help you explore various trip ideas. It’s a unique tool that helps you move past much of your indecision and potential planning roadblocks.
It remains to be seen whether the feature has staying power or whether competitors will integrate a similar feature. Still, for now, it represents a unique advantage for Expedia over competitor experiences.
With more than 3.4 million ratings, the Expedia app is rated 4.8 out of 5 stars in the Apple app store. It is also the #4 overall travel app as of the time of this writing. Only Uber, Airbnb, and Lyft are listed higher than Expedia’s app.
Considering Customer Service
Naturally, when you compare Booking vs. Expedia, customer service needs to be a top consideration. While the beauty of online travel agencies is that they are convenient and easily accessible, the downside is that you lose some of that personal touch.
Before we dive deeper into customer service and online reviews, allow me to make an observation. While customers that had bad experiences seek out places to leave a bad review online, the Booking and Expedia mobile apps are rated extremely well.
And even though customer service is much broader than mobile app usage, in my experience, I don’t rate apps near five stars when I have a bad overall experience. So keep that in mind.
Booking.com Customer Service
Even though it is important to keep in mind that most people that jump online to leave reviews have a score to settle, Booking.com’s Trustpilot score leaves something to be desired. With more than 40,000 reviews, Booking.com’s customer service is rated as “bad.” This is based on the customer scoring 1.2 out of 5 stars. Even so, nearly 10,000 people rate Booking.com as five stars.
This is in line with most of the travel agencies online but lower than a few of the competitors. Priceline has the most impressive Trustpilot score in the industry.
As a reminder, Booking.com offers priority customer service to Level 3 customers in its loyalty program. I will let you decide whether or not that makes their Trustpilot rating better or worse. Still, it’s worth considering if you travel often.
Expedia Customer Service
What Expedia makes up for in expansive listings and advanced search features, they lack in independent customer service scores. There are fewer than 10,000 reviews on Trustpilot, but their score is rated as ‘bad’ based on a rating of 1.1 of 5 stars.
This doesn’t mean that you should avoid Expedia.com at all costs. Most travelers have no problem, and only the most angry customers tend to seek out places like Trustpilot to leave reviews. Even so, if you are concerned about cancellations or general customer service issues, you might consider Priceline.com instead of utilizing Expedia.
In comparing Booking vs. Priceline, it is interesting the same company owns them, but Priceline has much better customer reviews.
Diving Deeper in Comparing Booking.com vs. Expedia
It’s always helpful to start a brand comparison by providing a little background information to set the stage. Expedia and Priceline are much more than just two travel booking sites. Respectively, they control the travel booking industry in ways you might not imagine.
More About Booking
It’s likely unsurprising that Booking.com is part of Booking Holdings, Inc., but did you know that other travel brands, including Priceline.com, Kayak, Agoda, RentalCars.com, and Open Table, are all part of the same family? Even though there seem to be nearly endless online travel agencies, most of them are part of one of two families.
Booking Holdings is one of the largest aggregations of online travel and related services. The result is greater scale, nearly endless lodging options, exclusive pricing, and a robust rewards program.
Booking.com grew from humble beginnings. The founders created Booking in Amsterdam way back in 1996. I can’t think of many Dutch start-ups that achieved such global prominence, but Booking.com certainly fits that bill. Today, the site offers tens of millions of potential accommodations and a site available in more than 40 languages.
And when you compare Booking vs. Kayak, even within the same family, the sites have very different designs. That is one reason their success is so impressive.
More About Expedia
While Expedia.com is one of the most popular travel booking sites on the internet, the Expedia Group owns Expedia.com. In fact, they own much more than Expedia.com. They also own the likes of Travelocity, Hotels.com, VRBO, Orbitz, Trivago, and several other entities.
In fact, when you compare Expedia.com vs. Travelocity, you realize they are virtually the exact same websites.
The downside for you is that there isn’t as much variety on the web as you probably thought. On the other hand, Expedia has access to massive amounts of data, which they can use to improve their products, offerings, and recommendations.
Booking vs. Expedia: Which Should You Choose?
In comparing Booking vs. Expedia, it’s a little like a Midwesterner choosing whether to follow the Los Angeles Lakers or the Boston Celtics. Both brands are behemoths with winning records. Still, you might prefer the personality and style of one over the other.
The Pros and Cons: Booking vs. Expedia
As you might expect, each site has its own pros and cons.
Booking is popular because of its broad selection, global presence, and ease of use. On the downside, Booking.com has questionable customer service ratings. Still, many people love booking.com because they don’t charge reservation fees.
Similarly, Expedia is popular because of bundled deals and rewards program, as well as their Hotel Price Guarantee. At the same time, Expedia.com also charges fees and offers poorly rated customer service.
The mobile apps for both brands offer fantastic interfaces that are easy to use, offsetting much of the customer service issues.
While Booking and Expedia are similar services, Kayak.com is very different. If these sites don’t provide what you are looking for, compare Booking or Expedia vs. Kayak.
Our Recommendation: Booking or Expedia?
In comparing Booking.com vs. Expedia.com, I prefer Booking.com. The tiered rewards program is a real benefit for frequent travelers. Plus, access to a global network provides nearly endless options.
Booking.com offers secure booking and no reservation fees. And while some people get frustrated determining whether to contact the travel agency or the provider with problems, Booking offers 24/7 customer service in 40 languages.
Regardless of where you choose to book your next travel adventure, we hope you enjoy your time away from the daily grind!
