Superhost needs a 4.8 or higher overall rating, 10 completed stays or 3 stays totalling at least 100 nights, a cancellation rate under 1%, and a response to 90% of new messages within 24 hours. Airbnb assesses it every three months, over the previous twelve. Guest Favourite is a separate thing, assessed daily, and it belongs to the listing rather than to you.
Both are worth understanding properly, because one of them follows you for a year and the other can arrive or vanish overnight.
The four Superhost criteria
Airbnb publishes them plainly, and they are all pass-or-fail:
- A 4.8 or higher overall rating. One low score moves that average furthest on a new listing, and how to respond to a bad review covers the public response and the two grounds on which a review comes down.
- At least 10 completed reservations, or 3 reservations totalling at least 100 nights.
- A cancellation rate under 1%, with exceptions for cancellations caused by what Airbnb calls Major Disruptive Events or other valid reasons.
- A 90% response rate: replying to new messages, and accepting or declining requests, within 24 hours.
Three of those four are operational rather than aesthetic. You can have a beautiful property and lose Superhost on a slow week of replies.
The assessment calendar is the part that matters
Superhost is assessed every three months, with periods beginning on 1 January, 1 April, 1 July and 1 October, and each assessment looks at the previous 12 months of performance.
That combination is what most hosts miss. A run of three-star reviews in February is still inside the window at the following February’s assessment. One cancelled booking in a 60-stay year is 1.7%, which is above the threshold, and it stays above it until those 60 stays roll out of the window.
The practical reading: recovery is slow and arithmetic. If you are below 4.8 now, the route back is enough new five-star stays to move a twelve-month average, which takes as long as your booking pace takes.
Guest Favourite works on a different clock
Guest Favourite is not a version of Superhost. It attaches to the listing, it is evaluated automatically every day, and Airbnb describes it as based on “ratings, reviews and reliability data from over half a billion trips”.
To be eligible, a listing needs:
- At least five guest reviews, and excellent ones.
- High marks in the category ratings: check-in, cleanliness, accuracy, host communication, location and value.
- A superb record of reliability, which Airbnb quantifies as host cancellations and quality-related customer service issues at 1% on average.
Two programmes, often confused
Superhost against Guest Favourite
What it attaches to
Superhost: you, the host account. Guest Favourite: the individual listing.
How often
Superhost: every three months, looking back twelve. Guest Favourite: evaluated automatically every day.
The bar
Superhost: four fixed thresholds. Guest Favourite: comparative, against other listings.
Speed of change
Superhost: slow to lose, slow to regain. Guest Favourite: can appear or disappear within days.
The highlight for top homes
Above Guest Favourite there is a further marker. Airbnb shows a highlight for the top listings, displayed as top 1%, 5% or 10%, with a trophy alongside the Guest Favourite badge. It “shows how eligible listings compare to others based on ratings, reviews and reliability”.
The inputs are the ones you would expect by now: overall star ratings and review feedback, host and guest communication, the six category ratings, host cancellation rates, and quality issues reported to Airbnb support.
What a badge actually changes
Airbnb states that Superhosts get added visibility, rewards and a badge on the listing and profile. Guest Favourite and the top-homes highlight put a visible marker on the search card and the listing page.
What that amounts to is a conversion aid. A badge makes a guest who has already found your listing more likely to choose it, because it answers the question a stranger silently asks about a stranger’s home.
What a badge will not fix
It will not create demand that is not there.
If your listing is not appearing for the searches your guests actually run, or the first photo is not earning the click, or the price sits in the wrong band for the property, a badge changes nothing, because nobody is reaching the card it sits on. That is a different problem with a different diagnosis, and why an Airbnb stops getting bookings works through it in order.
The sequence that works is unglamorous: get found, earn the click, deliver the stay, collect the review. The badges are the fourth thing, and they follow the first three rather than substituting for them.
What this looks like when someone else runs the property
Three of the four Superhost criteria are operational commitments rather than qualities:
- Response rate is a staffing question. Ninety per cent of messages answered within 24 hours is a rota.
- Cancellation rate is a calendar-discipline question. Most host cancellations come from double bookings, which come from calendars that are not synced.
- Review scores come from the changeover: accuracy against the listing, cleanliness, check-in that works at 11pm.
That is the work we take on, and it is why what a management company actually does is worth reading before choosing one. We do not promise a badge, because the ratings belong to guests and nobody can promise you those. The work that tends to produce them is what a full service is.
If you want to know what your property could realistically earn before you weigh any of this up, a free Airbnb valuation gives you a range with the assumptions shown, and full management is how we run it if the numbers work.
Frequently asked questions
How long does it take to get Superhost back after losing it?
As long as it takes your booking pace to move a twelve-month average past the threshold you missed. Because each assessment looks back a full year, a bad quarter stays inside the calculation for four assessments. There is no appeal for missing a threshold, and no way to shorten the window.
Does Guest Favourite replace Superhost?
No. They run side by side and measure different things. Superhost is assessed quarterly against four fixed thresholds and attaches to you as a host. Guest Favourite is evaluated daily, is comparative against other listings, and attaches to the listing itself.
Do I lose Superhost if I use a management company?
It depends whose account the listing sits in. Superhost status belongs to the host account, so if a manager moves your listing onto theirs, the status and the review history that earned it sit with that account. This is the clause to check before signing, and what an Airbnb management agreement should say covers how.
Is Superhost worth chasing?
Every criterion is something a well-run property does anyway: reply quickly, do not cancel, describe the place accurately, clean it properly. Treat it as a by-product of that work. Hosts who optimise for the badge itself tend to game one number and let the others slide, which costs them the thing they were chasing.
Sources
- Airbnb Help Centre: How to become a Superhost (the four criteria, the quarterly assessment beginning 1 January, 1 April, 1 July and 1 October over the prior 12 months, and the stated benefits; checked 2026-09-30)
- Airbnb Help Centre: Guest Favourites (daily evaluation, the five-review minimum, the six category ratings and the 1% reliability record; checked 2026-09-30)
- Airbnb Resource Centre: What to know about the highlight for top homes (the top 1%, 5% and 10% highlight and what it is based on; checked 2026-09-30)
