Best Hotel Booking Sites 2022

Online Travel Agencies are websites that provide a platform for all things travels related. They can range from flight booking to hotel booking to even booking tickets for tourist attractions. There are usually overlaps in what kind of services they offer, and some OTA platforms provide bundles (Agoda has flight & hotel bundles; KKday has hotel & attraction packages etc.)

The pros about OTAs, in general, are that they are the direct middlemen between you and your hotel chain. This means that transactions are much easier to make as all you have to do is use their platform to checkout instead of redirecting. They also tend to offer membership perks that allow you to save up on accommodation costs via deals, discount codes, reward nights, and more.

The cons of OTAs, in general, are that they only provide one price on that platform, and it is usually the price they set, which can be a hassle if your priority is to look for the best price in the market for that specific room. They may also not have the hotels or even rooms available on their platform, which can be deceiving if you could have gotten that dream room you wanted if you searched on another site.

Aggregators, or metasearch engines, are websites that compare hotel deals from different OTAs and direct booking websites to show you what is the lowest price or the best deal. What they do have in common with OTAs is the details they provide about the hotel information. Examples of aggregators are Trivago, Skyscanner, TripAdvisor, Kayak, HotelsCombined, and Google.

The pros of aggregators, in general, are that they are not restricted to the pricing of one platform, making it easier for you to compare prices between different places. They also do not restrict themselves to OTAs as they can offer rooms that are only available via direct booking from the hotel website.

The cons of aggregators are that they will just redirect you to another website. Making the transaction process even longer (Except for HotelsCombined). Since their business model is different, they also do not have any membership/rewards perks and incentives like OTAs or direct booking from hotels.

Since there is not much difference between aggregators other than the amount of information given for a hotel, or which OTA/hotel websites they are pulling in to get the best price, we will not be comparing them in the article.

Agoda's homepage features a minimalistic search design that allows you to search according to your travel requirements. If you are a solo traveller looking for your own, Agoda will enable you to save up to 12% per booking.

Agoda’s bundle deals make Agoda an attractive website if you want to save more on big-ticket expenses like air travel and accommodation, freeing up your expenditure to enjoy your destinations more. Agoda also has one of the best price-matching guarantees, as they will match the price of the same room and condition if you find a cheaper rate on another website.

Available filter options include a secret deal listing to view highly discounted hotels and insider deals. You can enjoy hidden deals that do not appear on the search engine unless logged in. Meaning if any aggregate website shows Agoda as the best value for money for that hotel, you best believe they have more discounts up their sleeves for members. Agoda provides tiered membership (AgodaVIP) packages the more you book for travel services using their platform. Each membership provides you with up to 25% off VIP deals for the highest tier.

Many rooms available offer the flexibility to pay now or later, with a free cancellation policy. You can also search for hotels that do not require a credit card to book. Essential features such as Cleanliness, Location, Value for Money, Facilities and Service are also given ratings by users.

If you are the type of person who likes to stay in well-known hotel chains, such as ibis, Hilton, Carlton, Conrad, Westin, and so much more, AccorPlus provides one of the best promotional prices if you sign up as a member for free.

AccorPlus provides a 10% discount on hotel rates for all their members on top of their already lower prices compared to other hotels; hot deals can range from up to 50% off. A night’s stay at Fairmont Hotel Singapore (since they do not have hotel G) during the weekend would cost S$5526 on all other platforms but S$447.20 on AccorPlus without a membership discount.

You can also enjoy up to 50% off dining and 15% off drinks when you book a hotel at over 1,400 restaurants worldwide, which provides an excellent package for dining and staying!

If you are planning to stay in a non-chain hotel or a smaller chain that is not as well known usually due to cheaper hotel rates or a different experience, AccorPlus might not be the best platform to use.

Trip.com is owned by a Chinese company named cTrip, and it has the most users in China. As Chinese middle-class tourism is rapidly growing, trip.com has to accommodate their needs by providing a huge variety of accommodation, with over 1,200,000 hotels in more than 200 countries. This target audience of Chinese tourists frequently visits the most, and they tend to be highly competitive in pricing rates for accommodations in Asia, especially China.

Trip.com has a price alert feature that will notify you via email or app if the hotel rate has dropped below the price you set for the alert. For example, if hotel A is current at $150, and you set the price alert at $135, trip.com will notify you will the price goes below $135. No other OTA platform does this.

Their app also provides exclusive deals of up to 50% off, a travel reminder, and automatic flight alerts.

Both hotels.com and Expedia are under the Expedia Group. They offer the most intuitive platform to customise your booking. While most platforms tend to separate non-refundable options and breakfast options for the same room type, Expedia and Hotels.com put them together. Both platforms provide comprehensive details about the hotel and room amenities.

Expedia provides a free rewards program to earn and redeem points as you book and travel. Hotels.com, on the other hand, Hotels.com provides a more specialised incentive, such as earning one reward night for every ten nights you stay, as well as providing a 10% when you register to the rewards programme for free or download their app and log in.

Booking.com is the world’s oldest site to book hotels. Since it has the first movers advantage of having a more established online presence and branding than other platforms, it boasts the largest variety of accommodations, with over 28 million listings in 200+ countries and over 50 million verified guest reviews. Booking.com, like Agoda, also has one of the best reputations in terms of price matching guarantee, as they will refund you the difference if you find a cheaper deal elsewhere.

Booking.com also provides free cancellation that is not common on other platforms, making it suitable for last-minute unforeseen circumstances. They also have the best hotel reviews because they are well known.

Klook is one of the best platforms in terms of everything destination-related. Klook has more travel activities and travel packages than other platforms as it serves as an all-in-one site for all things related to travel. They provide hotels and transportation (flights, trains, car rentals) and travel activities in general, they also provide sales of international SIM cards and Wi-Fi Access Plans.

If you like to pay for experiences and your hotel stay, consider Klook, as they always provide great deals and bundles related to that. Not only that, Klook is one of the best places to book a staycation, as they tend to provide dining/attraction packages at an attractive rate along with your stay. Making your experiences more worthwhile.

What makes Traveloka attractive is that they do not have booking fees or hidden charges (with the only expectation of deposit fees), and the hotels are priced inclusive of GST. This allows them to provide the cheapest rates possible without any member sign-in. You can also download the Traveloka app for better features such as price alerts, flight status, etc. Traveloka also has a section for you to book for COVID-19 Tests for VTL requirements.

Klook and Traveloka tend to be neck to neck in bringing one of the best hotel rates for the Asia-Pacific region. They dispute the attractive rates and a jack-of-all-trades platform. Their websites seem to be bloated, and it takes longer to navigate with so many redirects. You will be better off using their mobile app for a better experience.

KKday is a relatively new website that provides an all-in-one travel solution, similar to Klook and Traveloka. Their information about a hotel is similar to a blog review, rather than just a hotel summary. So if you want to know more about the experience of staying in the accommodation, KKDay provides that. Despite this, KKDay is extremely limited in its destinations and hotels per destination.