Instant Book or booking requests on Airbnb: how each one works and which suits a holiday flat

Short answer: with Instant Book, a guest who meets your requirements books on the spot, without you having to approve anything; with booking requests ("Approve all bookings"), each request reaches you and you have 24 hours to accept or decline it, or it expires and lowers your response rate. Airbnb says listings with Instant Book may appear higher in searches, because for the others it measures how long you take to respond and how many requests you decline. For a licensed holiday flat on the Costa del Sol, the sensible choice is usually Instant Book with a well-synced calendar and clear house rules.

How does each option work?

With Instant Book, all guests have to accept your house rules before booking, and Airbnb requires everyone who books to verify their identity. For the guest, Instant Book is available if they have completed their account setup and the stay is shorter than 31 nights.

How is it turned on or off?

1. Go to Listings and choose the listing.
2. In the listing editor, click Booking settings.
3. Choose Use Instant Book or Approve all bookings.
4. If you turn on Instant Book, select your guest requirements and click Save.

If you are just starting out, Airbnb offers some new hosts the option to approve their first 3 or 5 bookings manually while they get used to the platform (according to Airbnb, it is a limited trial and does not appear to everyone; October 2026).

What requirements can I set for guests with Instant Book?

On top of Airbnb's general requirements, you can add two (October 2026):

• Good track record (on another help page, "Good standing"): the guest must have completed a stay without incidents or bad reviews.
• Pre-booking message: a message with questions the guest has to answer when booking.

They can only be added with Instant Book turned on. Watch out for the side effect: Airbnb warns that, if a guest does not meet one of your requirements (good standing, advance notice, preparation time), your listing may not even appear to them in search. A very strict filter leaves out people new to Airbnb who would have been good guests.

Other settings on the same screen that work as a filter:

• Advance notice: from the same day (with a cut-off time) to at least 7 days.
• Preparation time between bookings, for cleaning.
• Minimum and maximum stay: if you set no maximum, one of 31 nights applies.
• If someone books within the 48 hours before and wants to arrive outside your check-in hours, it does not go through as an instant booking: it reaches you as a request and you decide.

What happens with a booking request?

When it arrives, the dates are blocked on your calendar so they do not overlap. You have 24 hours to accept or decline. If you do not reply, it expires, and on top of that the dates stay blocked until you open them manually: a slip like that costs you the booking and the days.

The response rate is the percentage of new requests and enquiries you answer within 24 hours over the last 30 days; declining counts as a response, letting it expire does not. Enquiries (questions before booking) do not expire, although Airbnb asks you to answer them within 24 hours too.

Does declining a request harm the listing?

If you do it within 24 hours, Airbnb says it does not affect your Superhost status or your position in searches. But declining frequently can affect your booking rates and where your listing appears. To decline without harming yourself:

1. Do it before it expires, never by letting it lapse.
2. Decide whether you keep the dates blocked or open them for another guest.
3. If you change your mind, you can ask them for a new request or send them a special offer.
4. Check Airbnb's Nondiscrimination Policy first: the reason can never be the guest's origin.

If what does not suit you is an enquiry, you can also decline the enquiry, and the guest will no longer be able to send you a request.

And if someone I do not want gets in with Instant Book?

You can cancel, but normally with the penalties of the host cancellation policy (we explain it here). Airbnb allows cancelling an instant booking without consequences in some cases, for example if the guest makes it clear that they are not going to follow a house rule (smoking, bringing a pet) or if they have several negative reviews or an empty profile that worries you. Sometimes you have to ask Airbnb for this and provide evidence. And it warns that, if you cancel many instant bookings, you may have to turn the feature off.

The other risk of Instant Book does not come from the guest, but from the calendar: a double booking with Booking. Airbnb acknowledges that, on rare occasions, it can happen if you sync your calendar with another website, and then you have to cancel one.

Which suits a holiday flat on the Costa del Sol?

What Airbnb says points to Instant Book: it can improve your position in searches, it helps your response rate (which counts towards being a Superhost) and it removes the risk of losing bookings by not replying in time. In a flat that lives off filling dates in an area with a lot of supply, that matters. For it to work:

• A calendar synced with Booking and the other platforms, so you do not sell the same night twice.
• Clear house rules, which the guest accepts when booking and which let you cancel without a penalty if they announce they are going to break them (parties and noise).
• Minimum stay and advance notice according to the season (prices and seasons).
• The good track record requirement only if losing visibility with new guests is really worth it to you.

Requests make sense if someone is always going to be watching their phone to reply in under 24 hours and you prefer to review each booking, knowing that Airbnb takes it into account when ranking results.

What does a manager do with this?

A manager reviews the booking settings of each listing, keeps the calendar synced across platforms and answers requests and enquiries within 24 hours, also at night and at weekends. On Airbnb they work as co-host within the owner's listing, so the settings and the history are still yours.