How Can I Find a Friend’s Profile on Airbnb? (Know what is Visible on the Booking Website)

Last Updated on July 10, 2023 By Emma W. Thomas

On Airbnb, there is no filter or function you can use to find a person’s profile. If you are hell-bent on finding your friend, you can Google search their name, location, plus the term Airbnb at the end. The results will bring you as close as possible, but never the exact property. To find their profile, you have to search for them manually.

Another way that you can use to find your friend on Airbnb is by requesting them to send you a link to their listing. Once you get the link, you can access the listing as a guest and book it or do whatever you want.

Accessing a host’s or guest’s profile can be handy since you both are strangers to each other. For the host, accessing the guest’s profile is paramount in assessing whether to accept or reject their booking. The guest might need to know who the host is for security reasons.

Airbnb makes sure that the host and guest profiles are viewable once the booking has been made. Information like your name, photo, address, and previous reviews are visible when interacting with the host, but not before. Once the booking has been confirmed, any sensitive information is visible to guests and hosts to ease the booking process. So, if you are not a host or guest, it may be difficult to find your friend’s profile on Airbnb. 

What is visible on your Airbnb profile?

Once you create an Airbnb profile, there are various personal details you have to submit to make it official. They include your name, address, contacts, identity, reviews, languages you speak, and your occupation. 

However, not all the information is visible on your Airbnb profile. The host or the guest can only access the details after agreeing on the booking.

Here is a list of the different information you provide and how it will be seen on the profile:

1. Name. While you provide your full name on the profile, only your first name will be seen by other people on the website.  
2. Language. Indicating what language you speak on your profile is important, especially if you do not use the local dialect of the region you are visiting. This allows the host or guest to plan how you will communicate and agree to conduct business. Therefore, the language information will be visible to everyone.
3. Occupation. As you enter the details, you will find a space to write what kind of job you do. Information like this is not compulsory and will not be visible on your profile.  
4. Reviews. Airbnb allows guests and hosts to review each other after a successful interaction. A good review builds a positive reputation, and it can increase your chances of getting a booking quicker and faster. If you have bad or no reviews, it can lessen your chances of getting a booking as a guest or a host. The review part on your profile is not optional or up to you to make it visible. Once it is done, anyone who has access to it will see it on your profile.
5. Identification. Your email address and phone number should be included in your profile. Information like this helps in verifying identities. Your identification is not shown on your profile for both the guest and host, but it is indicated that your identity has been confirmed and verified. 
6. About. The section on about is a part that you can use to describe what you like, your interest, dislikes, and any other information. It is recommended not to provide personal information that can be used to identify you, as this is visible on the profile. 
7. The date you registered as an Airbnb member. Once you are through with registration, the website will mark down the date and is visible to other Airbnb members.

If you feel that you do not want some information that you already put on your profile to be seen, you can edit your profile and remove it.

When you are done setting up your Airbnb profile, only other people on the website can see it. Specific details like contacts and full names are not visible to everyone.

How can you look up a guest’s profile on Airbnb as a host?

As a host, it is natural for you to want to know who you are letting into your property. However, Airbnb does not allow you to look up their guest’s profiles beforehand.

Information like profile picture, full name, and other details will only be available after confirming the booking.

Some details about a guest are hidden to reduce the chances of discrimination against certain people.

The host or guest can cancel their booking after it is confirmed, but there is a cost incurred.

Below are a few things you can do to reduce the chances of booking troublesome guests:

• Only accept verified guests on your premises. Airbnb allows you to set the parameters or rules you require the guest to fulfil if you want to book their listing. Indicating that you only allow verified guests on your premises can ease your worries. 

When you specify that you need your guests to have a verified account, you must also have a verified account as the host.

• Read the guest reviews. Reviews show who the guest is and how they conduct themselves as clients. Going through previous reviews can help assess if the guest is a potential risk.
• Include ID verification as a rule on your listing. An ID checks before someone accesses the property is a sure way of knowing who is renting your premises. You have to write down their details once they show you their ID. If anything goes wrong, you will have a sure way of identifying them.
• Add pre-booking questionnaire to your listing. You can add some easy questions to your listing to help you know some basic information about your guest. Their age or purpose of visiting can help you assess if they are the right fit for your establishment.
• Check for red flags on the guest’s profile. This applies to all guests, verified or unverified. If for some reason, you find something on the guest’s profile that does not sit right with you, you can cancel the booking. Red flags can include omission of profile pictures and other small details or even declining to answer questions asked during the booking process.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is it possible to look up a host on Airbnb?

Airbnb does not have a feature that allows you to look up a specific host on their website. To find a certain listing, you must know its name, price range, location, property type, and other critical details. However, if you know the property’s name, you can search them using the function provided. The website will narrow it down for you then you can find them by their profile.

Once you find the hosts you are looking for or the one that bests suits you, the website will redirect you to the property’s profile. On the host’s profile, you will see their reviews, verification status, and everything else about them.

A host’s profile is in such a format that you can access anything you want to know about them and their property. For additional information, you will find a tab for contacting the owner of the property to make more inquiries.

Even without a feature that allows guests to search for a host, some people have come up with some genius ways to circumnavigate this problem, like using Google to find specific listings.

How to share your Airbnb profile or listing

As a host, you might want to advertise your listing on other social media websites to get more clients. To share your profile, you have to follow a few steps.

1. Open your profile on the Airbnb website and go to the Listings tab and click on it.
2. Once the listings tab opens, click on ‘preview listings’ and tap share.
3. Select and follow the steps required on the next app or website to share your listing.

Can I refer someone to a host or join Airbnb?

A while back, Airbnb had a feature that you could use to recommend a guest to a certain host, but it has been scrapped. The only referral left on the website is one where you can direct someone to join the Airbnb community as a host or a guest.

Final Thought

There is no feature on Airbnb that you can use to search for a specific host or guest. However, there are some genius tactics that people have developed to find specific hosts on the website. These tactics include using google, which might take you a minute or two to get to where you want, but they have proven useful in some instances.

References:

https://www.airbnb.com/help/article/2157/check-a-guests-profile-photo

https://www.ourescapeclause.com/how-to-use-airbnb-tips-for-guests/