Is Kayak or Smoobu better?

Neither clearly leads. Kayak starts at Free and Smoobu at €29/month, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.

Which is cheaper, Kayak or Smoobu?

Kayak has a free tier; the other does not. Paid plans start at Free for Kayak and €29/month for Smoobu.

Does Kayak or Smoobu run on more platforms?

Kayak runs on iOS, Android, Web. Smoobu runs on Web, iOS, Android.

Can I use Kayak for free?

Yes. Kayak has a free tier, so you can try it without paying. Smoobu starts at €29/month.

What is Kayak best used for?

Kayak is most often used for comparing flight prices across multiple airlines and booking sites before purchasing, setting a price alert to buy a flight or hotel once the price drops, searching flexible dates or nearby airports to find a cheaper fare, comparing car hire prices across rental companies for a trip. Of those, comparing flight prices across multiple airlines and booking sites before purchasing and setting a price alert to buy a flight or hotel once the price drops are not what Smoobu is typically brought in for.

What can Kayak do that Smoobu cannot?

Kayak covers Flight, hotel and car comparison, Price alerts, Price prediction, Flexible date search. Smoobu covers Channel manager, Website builder, Guest messaging, Unified calendar.

Travel · head to head

Kayak vs Smoobu

Kayak

Travel

Travel search app comparing flights, hotels and car hire across other booking sites, owned by Booking Holdings

From: Free
Rated: -

Full review Website

Smoobu

Travel

All-in-one channel manager and PMS for hosts with a handful of holiday rentals

From: €29/month
Rated: -

Full review Website

The short version

Only Kayak has a free tier, so it costs nothing to try first.
Each has a real cost: Kayak it is owned by Booking Holdings, the same parent as Booking.com and Priceline, so its comparison results are not fully independent of its own group's commercial interests.; Smoobu the Flex plan carries a 0.9% fee on every booking, which on an apartment turning over €40,000 a year costs more than the entire annual subscription saving, and the pricing page presents Flex as the cheaper option.
They diverge on capability: Kayak covers Flight, hotel and car comparison, Smoobu covers Channel manager.
Prices and features above were last checked on 1 September 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Kayak and Smoobu actually diverge.

Attributes where Kayak and Smoobu differ
Attribute	Kayak	Smoobu
Starting price	Free	€29/month
Pricing model	Free to users, revenue from referral commissions and advertising	Per unit per month
Free tier	Yes	No
Platforms	iOS, Android, Web	Web, iOS, Android

Identical on both: user rating (Not yet rated), category (Travel).

What each one covers

Drawn from each product's published feature list. An absence here means we hold no record of it - not that the product lacks it.

Only in Kayak

Flight, hotel and car comparison
Price alerts
Price prediction
Flexible date search
Trip planning tools
Explore/anywhere search

Only in Smoobu

Channel manager
Website builder
Guest messaging
Unified calendar
Invoicing and e-invoicing
Mobile apps

What people use each for

The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.

Kayak

Comparing flight prices across multiple airlines and booking sites before purchasingnot Smoobu
Setting a price alert to buy a flight or hotel once the price dropsnot Smoobu
Searching flexible dates or nearby airports to find a cheaper farenot Smoobu
Comparing car hire prices across rental companies for a tripnot Smoobu

Smoobu

A host with three apartments in Berlin who needs Airbnb and Booking.com calendars kept in sync and wants a direct booking site to cut OTA commissionnot Kayak
An owner wanting automated check-in instructions and pre-arrival messages sent per channel without logging into each extranetnot Kayak
A small manager who needs guest invoices that meet German documentation requirements without adding a separate accounting toolnot Kayak
A host testing dynamic pricing through the bundled trial before deciding whether to subscribe to PriceLabs separatelynot Kayak

Where each one falls short

Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.

Kayak

It is owned by Booking Holdings, the same parent as Booking.com and Priceline, so its comparison results are not fully independent of its own group's commercial interests.
Some airlines opt out of listing on metasearch sites entirely, so Kayak's results are not a complete view of every available fare in the market.
Revenue comes from referral commissions, and prominence in results can be influenced by which suppliers pay Kayak more, not purely by lowest price.
The actual booking typically completes on a third party site, so problems with a booking, cancellation or refund are handled by that site's customer service, not Kayak's.
Displayed prices can change or fail to match by the time a user reaches the booking site, since Kayak is not always querying live inventory in real time for every listed fare.

Smoobu

The Flex plan carries a 0.9% fee on every booking, which on an apartment turning over €40,000 a year costs more than the entire annual subscription saving, and the pricing page presents Flex as the cheaper option.
Pricing is per unit, so a ten unit portfolio pays roughly €31.50 plus nine additional units at about €9.60, and the headline monthly figure covers a single apartment only.
Write access is charged per account beyond the included seats, so a cleaner, a co-host and an owner all needing to edit bookings turn into a recurring per seat cost.
There is no trust accounting or owner statement generation, so anyone managing units on behalf of third-party owners has to build payout reporting outside the system.
Housekeeping and maintenance dispatch is minimal compared with manager-grade platforms, so cleaning coordination happens in WhatsApp or a separate tool once you are past a few units.

Pricing, plan by plan

Kayak

Free

FreeFree
- Unlimited search and price alerts
- No subscription tier

Smoobu

€29/month

Professional Flex$29/month
- One unit included
- 0.9% fee on every booking
- Channel manager, website builder, messaging
Professional Prepaid$31.5/month
- One unit included
- No booking fee
- Website builder, invoicing, chatbot, API access
Teams Pro+$49.5/month
- Everything in Prepaid
- E-invoicing
- Two write-access accounts, extra accounts from about €12 each

Which should you pick?

Choose Kayak if

You need flight, hotel and car comparison.
You want to start without paying.
You work on iOS, Android, Web.
You also want price alerts.

Kayak review

Choose Smoobu if

You need channel manager.
You work on Web, iOS, Android.
You also want website builder.

Smoobu review

Questions people ask

Is Kayak or Smoobu better?: Neither clearly leads. Kayak starts at Free and Smoobu at €29/month, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Kayak or Smoobu?: Kayak has a free tier; the other does not. Paid plans start at Free for Kayak and €29/month for Smoobu.
Does Kayak or Smoobu run on more platforms?: Kayak runs on iOS, Android, Web. Smoobu runs on Web, iOS, Android.
Can I use Kayak for free?: Yes. Kayak has a free tier, so you can try it without paying. Smoobu starts at €29/month.
What is Kayak best used for?: Kayak is most often used for comparing flight prices across multiple airlines and booking sites before purchasing, setting a price alert to buy a flight or hotel once the price drops, searching flexible dates or nearby airports to find a cheaper fare, comparing car hire prices across rental companies for a trip. Of those, comparing flight prices across multiple airlines and booking sites before purchasing and setting a price alert to buy a flight or hotel once the price drops are not what Smoobu is typically brought in for.
What can Kayak do that Smoobu cannot?: Kayak covers Flight, hotel and car comparison, Price alerts, Price prediction, Flexible date search. Smoobu covers Channel manager, Website builder, Guest messaging, Unified calendar.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Kayak: Does Kayak charge a booking fee?

No, Kayak itself is free to use; it earns referral commissions from the airlines, hotels and sites it sends bookings to.

Smoobu: Which plan is actually cheaper, Flex or Prepaid?

Prepaid, for almost anyone with real occupancy. The 0.9% booking fee on Flex exceeds the subscription difference once annual revenue passes a few thousand euros.

Kayak: Do I book directly through Kayak?

Usually the booking completes on the airline, hotel or travel site's own platform after Kayak hands off the click, though some direct booking options exist for select content.

Smoobu: How many properties does the entry price cover?

One. Every additional unit adds roughly €9.60 per month.

Kayak: Is Kayak owned by an airline or hotel chain?

No, it is owned by Booking Holdings, which also owns Booking.com, Priceline and Agoda.

Smoobu: Does it include dynamic pricing?

Only two months free on the Teams tier. Ongoing dynamic pricing means subscribing to PriceLabs or similar.

Smoobu: Is there a contract?

Billing is monthly, yearly or two-yearly, with 30 days notice required to cancel; longer terms buy 10% or 20% off.

Kayak vs Smoobu

Kayak

Smoobu

The short version

Where they differ

What each one covers

Only in Kayak

Only in Smoobu

What people use each for

Kayak

Smoobu

Where each one falls short

Kayak

Smoobu

Pricing, plan by plan

Kayak

Smoobu

Which should you pick?

Choose Kayak if

Choose Smoobu if

Questions people ask

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Related pages

More on Kayak

More on Smoobu

Keep looking

Other head to heads