Ask a villa owner in Bali what they spend on marketing and they will usually name the photographer, the website and maybe some social media ads. OTA commission rarely makes the list, yet for many villas it is the biggest marketing cost of the year. Here is how the main platforms charge, how to work out what they cost you, and what that means for your direct booking plan.
This is part of our guide to getting more direct bookings for your Bali villa.
How Booking.com charges
Booking.com charges a commission on the value of each completed stay. There is no fee to list. For Bali properties the base rate is commonly around 15%, but the exact figure is set in your agreement and can differ by property and location.
The base rate is not always the full cost. Optional visibility programs, such as preferred partner status, raise your commission in exchange for better placement. Guest discount programs such as Genius lower the price the guest pays, which means less revenue for the same night. Both can be worth it, but count them as part of the cost of the channel.
How Airbnb charges
Airbnb has two fee models. Under the split fee, the host pays a small service fee, typically around 3%, and the guest pays a separate service fee at checkout. Under the host-only fee, the host pays the whole fee and the guest sees one price.
From 27 October 2025, Airbnb moved hosts who connect through property management software (PMS) or a channel manager to the host-only fee, at 15.5% of the booking. Many professionally managed Bali villas connect this way, so for them Airbnb now costs about the same as Booking.com. Check which model your listings use in your Airbnb account, because it changes your real margin.
Agoda, Expedia and others
Agoda and Expedia also work on commission, with the rate set in your contract. Agoda is popular with travelers from across Asia, which matters in Bali, so it is often worth keeping. Treat it like the others: a paid channel you measure, not a free source of guests.
Work out your real OTA cost
You do not need an accountant for this. Export last year's reservations from your PMS or each OTA extranet and fill in, for each channel:
- Total booking revenue
- Commission and fees paid
- Any discounts funded by you for that channel's programs
- Number of bookings
Divide the commission, fees and discounts by the number of bookings and you have the cost per booking for that channel. Divide them by revenue and you have the effective commission rate. The effective rate is often higher than the headline rate once programs and discounts are included.
A worked example
Here is an illustration with round numbers, not data from a real property. Say a three-bedroom villa averages 5,000,000 IDR a night and sells 200 nights a year, all through OTAs at an effective 15%.
- Room revenue: 1,000,000,000 IDR
- Commission paid: 150,000,000 IDR
Now say the villa shifts 20% of those nights, 40 nights, to direct bookings. The commission on those nights would have been 30,000,000 IDR. That is the budget a direct booking system has to beat. If card processing, the booking engine and the marketing that won those 40 bookings cost less than 30,000,000 IDR a year, the villa is ahead. And every repeat guest in later years costs even less to win.
Run the same sum with your own numbers. It is the clearest way to decide how much to invest in your website and marketing.
Direct bookings are not free
Direct bookings have their own costs:
- Booking engine or PMS fees, often a monthly subscription or a small fee per booking
- Payment processing, usually a few percent of each card payment
- Marketing, such as search ads, SEO and content
- Your team's time, answering enquiries and looking after guests
Payment processing grows with each booking, but it is a fraction of an OTA commission. The website, booking engine and much of the marketing cost roughly the same whether you sell 20 direct nights or 100, while OTA commission takes the same share of every night you sell.
What to do next
Once you know your numbers, set a direct share target you can reach, such as moving from 10% to 25% of nights in a year. Then build the parts of the system that get you there, starting with a website that can take a booking.
If you would like help working through your channel numbers, book a free strategy call with our team.
