When comparing vacation rental software options, you’ll undoubtedly notice there are various solutions on offer. Lodgify and Guesty are two of the most popular platforms that property owners and managers can use to manage their businesses. Both offer various excellent features. However, there are some key differences to consider when choosing between the two.
Who is it for?
Lodgify
Lodgify caters to all vacation rental businesses, ranging from single property owners to property managers with up to 30+ rentals. Because it caters to all vacation rental business owners, it’s built to be intuitive and user-friendly, allowing hosts to easily manage all of their operations from one app.
Guesty
Guesty used to target different customers with two separate apps: Guesty and Guesty for Hosts. Guesty targeted larger property management companies, while Guesty for Hosts targeted those with three properties or fewer.
However, Guesty has since launched Guesty Lite, aimed at vacation rental business owners with between one to three listings. Now, Guesty offers three plans for users with one to 200+ properties.
How much does it cost?
Lodgify
Lodgify offers three cost-effective pricing plans, with the lowest one starting at an affordable $15 per month. This includes all the essential features needed to effectively and efficiently run your business, such as a channel manager, a customizable and bookable website, a reservation and payment system, and a property management system.
Lodgify’s Professional plan stands out as the most popular choice, providing access to more advanced features and starting at a modest $43 per month.
The Ultimate plan is tailored toward businesses requiring even more advanced features, such as reporting, cleaning, and task management tools. This plan starts at just $55 per month.
Lodgify’s subscription plans can be charged in U.S. Dollars (USD), Euros (EUR), or British Pounds (GBP).
Guesty
Guesty pricing varies by region. For U.S. customers, Guesty Lite starts at $16 per month for annual plans (and $23 per month for monthly plans). Users who have more than three properties will need to request a quote for either the Pro or Enterprise plan. Guesty offers no further public information regarding pricing.
What are the main differences?
Website Builder
Lodgify
Lodgify’s vacation rental website builder tool is well-known in the industry for its user-friendly interface and customizable templates. With just a few clicks, users can create their own bookable website under their desired domain (www.yourwebsite.com) in less than five minutes without requiring any technical expertise.
What sets Lodgify apart is that its websites are optimized for SEO, resulting in an average of 40% of bookings being made directly by customers. Additionally, the website builder enables you to personalize your website, add widgets, and create as many pages as you want—including pages with local attractions or content that will help you rank even higher in search results.
For users who already have a website created using WordPress, Squarespace, Wix, or any other content management system (CMS), Lodgify offers seamless integration. By embedding the Lodgify booking widget, guests can now book properties directly on their website, even if it was previously not equipped for bookings.
Guesty
Pro, Enterprise, and Lite subscribers have access to their own direct booking website. It is called Booking Website for Lite users and Guesty Booking Engine for Pro users.
The basic plan has minimal opportunities for customization and a commitment of one year. Users can choose to pay $15 per month for connecting their own custom domain or $25 to purchase a new custom domain. It costs an additional $49 monthly to host advanced websites plus 0.5% of direct gross booking volume.
There is also an option for a Booking Engine API, but Open API is only available for Pro and Enterprise plans.
Onboarding
Lodgify
All customers are provided with a free personalized onboarding experience. A Lodgify specialist assesses the user’s business needs and works with them to set up their account, connect their listings, and guide them through all the features needed to successfully manage and grow their vacation rental business.
Guesty
Guesty offers guided onboarding with its Pro and Enterprise plans and additional “enterprise-ready onboarding” with its Enterprise plan alone. Onboarding is not included in Guesty’s Lite plan.
Channel manager
Lodgify
Lodgify’s custom-built channel manager connects all users, regardless of their plan, with all the major booking channels. To further expand your reach, Lodgify also offers two-way API integrations with popular OTAs like Expedia and TripAdvisor, among others. This feature ensures real-time synchronization of bookings and availability, maximizing your exposure and minimizing the risk of overbookings
Guesty
Guesty Lite’s multi-channel distribution is only available for Airbnb, Booking.com, and Vrbo. You have to upgrade to the Pro or Enterprise plan to access unlimited channel distribution.
Unified inbox
Lodgify
Lodgify’s unified inbox streamlines guest communication by allowing users to easily manage inquiries and messages across all channels from one centralized platform. It seamlessly integrates with Airbnb, Booking.com, Vrbo, etc., as well as the user’s own direct booking website. Users can create saved replies as well as use Lodgify’s automated responses for communication with guests and staff.
Hosts can even message their guests through WhatsApp from one centralized dashboard.
Guesty
Guesty’s unified inbox is a messaging tool that centralizes guest communication, including inquiries, emails, and SMS. It’s also possible to message through WhatsApp, but it requires their API users to have a business account.
User messages from the Guesty inbox via WhatsApp and SMS are sent to the guest’s phone number and can be viewed only on their phone. They will not appear in the relevant booking channel’s inbox.
Centralized calendar
Lodgify
Users can connect to and synchronize listings with all OTAs through the channel manager. Lodgify has built an API connection with Airbnb, Vrbo, Booking.com, and Expedia, which drives over 80% of customer bookings and allows instant synchronization of calendars, rates, bookings, and property data.
Lodgify can also connect users to any alternative or local channels through iCal.
Guesty
Guesty subscribers can also connect accounts from OTAs in its channel manager, but users need to use Guesty’s open API to integrate with a few additional channels. For Guesty Lite users, users can only connect to Booking.com, Vrbo, and Airbnb directly.
Integration with Google Vacation Rentals
Lodgify
One of Lodgify’s main goals is to help vacation rental owners and property managers increase direct bookings. As a result, Lodgify offers free integration with Google’s brand-new metasearch engine, Google Vacation Rentals (GVR). Professional and Ultimate hosts can list their Lodgify website through GVR, which will appear above all other organic searches, outranking even the most prominent OTAs.
Once guests find the vacation rental listing on GVR and click to book, they will be sent directly to the user’s website (and not a Lodgify page).
Guesty
While Guesty does offer a Google Vacation Rentals integration, those who do not have a Guesty Advanced Website must pay $4 USD per listing to take advantage of the offering. Users with more than 50 rentals receive a discount for Google Vacation Rentals, which starts at 25% off.
Mobile app
Lodgify
Hosts can manage their business on the go with Lodgify’s mobile app, which is available for Android and iOS. Users on the Ultimate plan can also download the Lodgify PM app to connect with cleaners, check-in agents, and rental managers. Plus, guests can download the Lodgify Guest app to easily access host resources, such as guidebooks, Wi-Fi passwords, check-in details, and so on.
Guesty
From the Guesty app, users can access many of the same features as Lodgify customers, except for the guidebook feature. Guesty’s mobile app is rated 2.3 stars on both Google Play and the App Store.
Custom rate strategies
Lodgify
Lodgify empowers you with custom rate strategies across all plans. Establish weekly, monthly, or custom rates, as well as promotions, giving you the freedom to attract a wide range of guests.
This flexibility not only helps you optimize your earnings but also enhances your property’s occupancy rate throughout the year, meaning that with Lodgify, you’re in full control of your pricing strategy, ensuring your vacation rental business thrives in any season.
Guesty
While Guesty does appear to offer custom rate strategies, it is not something that’s included in their most basic plan, Guesty Lite.
Customer support
Lodgify
All subscribers and trial users are entitled to free 24/7 customer support via phone, chat, and email, with fast response times. The Contact page provides telephone numbers for Sales support in the U.S. & Canada, the U.K., Australia, Spain, and Italy. Lodgify’s customer support is one of the best in the industry, providing comprehensive and personalized support to all subscribers, whether users have one property or multiple units.
Guesty
Customers can contact the Help Center 24/7 via email and automated live chat only, as there is no sales line for inquiries. Pro and Enterprise users can access “urgent phone support,” but it’s unclear what the parameters of that support are.
What do customers say about Lodgify?
Finding reliable and unbiased information while researching products online can pose a challenge for prospective customers. As a result, a significant majority of consumers, approximately 93%, state that online reviews have a significant impact on their purchasing choices.
When it comes to vacation rental owners and property managers, making informed decisions is crucial for the success of their business. Users can explore and compare Lodgify online, along with assessing the opinions of Lodgify customers. Here’s where to compare us:
Trustpilot
What people on Trustpilot are saying about Lodgify:
“Using Lodgify has been an awesome and easy experience from start to finish. Not only is the platform intuitive and really easy to use, they offer an onboarding service that teaches you how to make the most of the Service. Sara (our onboarding team member) could not have been more helpful, really supported us to make sense of the platform and how to get it to do most of the hardwork so we can focus on other things. Highly recommend to anyone managing short term holiday lets.” -Charlie H.
Lodgify rating: 4.6
Capterra
What people on Capterra are saying about Lodgify:
“We have no doubt that we chose well. The price is fair, service is excellent, the software is easy to use and it is a company that is always innovating and improving.” -Djamila D.
Lodgify rating: 4.5
GetApp
What people on GetApp are saying about Lodgify:
“The best feature about this product is the seamless-ness between third party software and my own website. It has all the information from everywhere in one place.” -Tara S.
Lodgify rating: 4.5
G2.com
What people on G2.com are saying about Lodgify:
“We went from being held back by AirBNB to in control of our own bookings! Occasionally, AirBNB would not authorize a booking or hold our account until an issue was resolved. Now we can offer direct bookings and VRBO booking options to our best guests. We love the ease of use of Lodgify, and how their customer support made it easy to implement both direct bookings and VRBO integration. We now only use Lodgify’s interface every day…” -Steven W.
Lodgify rating: 4.0
Can I try the software before I buy?
Lodgify
You can try Lodgify free of charge with a 7-day trial, which can be extended on request, or discover how Lodgify works by requesting a personalized demo call with a product expert who’ll guide the user through all the features and advise on the best subscription.
Alternatively, Lodgify offers access to a preconfigured test demo account, so it can be tested immediately without inputting any information on rentals or user data.
Guesty
While you can request a demo, there is currently no option for a free trial to try Guesty premium plans.
There is a 14-day free trial for Guesty Lite.
Which vacation rental software should I use?
Both Lodgify and Guesty are considered great options for PMs when it comes to vacation rental software. However, it’s important to consider the size of your rental property business and your specific needs before choosing.
Lodgify is the ideal choice for those looking for fairly-priced software that includes next-level features like a highly customizable website and outstanding customer onboarding and support.
Although Guesty Lite seems to be a good fit for smaller vacation rental businesses, keep in mind that it wasn’t initially developed by them; Guesty bought and acquired the Your Porter app and replaced the name with their own.
Meanwhile, Lodgify was carefully designed to meet the needs of all vacation rental professionals, and we strive to provide the most effective property management tools knowing that our success depends on our customers’ success.
We’re renowned for our professional customer support, unrivaled onboarding service, and empowering business owners around the world. With thousands of satisfied customers, there are many reasons why our customers choose Lodgify over Guesty.