Multilingual guest messaging for hosts: which languages Booking.com, Airbnb and WhatsApp translate

Airbnb translates messages between host and guest automatically in over 60 languages. Booking.com translates on request in only nine: English, German, French, Spanish, Dutch, Polish, Russian, Arabic and Portuguese. That covers the three largest overseas markets for UK hosts, the US, France and Germany, but not Korean, Italian, Czech or Ukrainian. WhatsApp on Android translates six languages.

Below: which languages your guests are likely to write in, from official visitor statistics; which platform or app translates what; what DeepL and Google Translate allow for free; how to set up templates so each guest reads their own language; and one arrival message in English, German, French and Spanish.

Which languages will your overseas guests write in?

For UK hosts, mostly English, French and German; for US hosts, English, German, Korean, French and Portuguese; for hosts in central Europe the mix changes again. The table shows the largest source markets from each country's official statistics and whether Booking.com's translator covers their language.

The UK received an estimated 42.6 million overseas visits in 2024, worth £31.6 billion, according to ONS. For the US, NTTO forecast 77.1 million international visitors for 2025, up from 72.4 million in 2024, but its own October 2025 count was 5.7 percent below October 2024, so treat the forecast with care. In Poland, foreign guests were 8.86 million of the 42.7 million tourists in registered accommodation in 2025, a fifth of the total.

Two caveats. These figures count visitors by country of residence, not by language: a French or Dutch guest may well write to you in English. And the Polish data covers only establishments with ten or more bed places, so a single apartment's guest mix can differ. What the data tells you is which languages are worth a template, not which ones you must speak.

Which platforms and apps translate which languages?

Airbnb translates on its own, Booking.com only when you ask and only nine languages, WhatsApp on Android six. Standalone translators cover everything on this page but cost you copy and paste.

For a UK host the practical result is good news: Booking.com translates the three biggest markets' languages with one click. For a US host, Korean guests, the third-largest overseas market in October 2025, need an outside translator on Booking.com. Italian guests need one everywhere except Airbnb.

WhatsApp added translation on 23 September 2025. It runs on the phone, and WhatsApp says it cannot see the translations. The Android list skips every major European language except English, Spanish, Portuguese and Russian. The announcement does not mention the WhatsApp Business app or the desktop version.

What do DeepL and Google Translate cost and allow?

Nothing, as long as you stay within the limits: Google Translate takes up to 5,000 characters at a time and DeepL's free version 50,000 characters a month. To turn that into guests, assume a 400-character message and a conversation of six messages from the guest and six from you, inquiry to checkout. That is 4,800 characters to translate per guest.

DeepL showed euro prices for Germany when we checked; the UK and US pages may show a different price. Among the features of its paid plans DeepL lists „No data training”.

The real cost is the clipboard. Every message passes through it twice, from the platform to the translator and back. Ten conversations a month is about 240 copy-and-paste operations, each one a chance to paste into the wrong thread.

How do you set up templates so each guest reads their own language?

Set it once per channel; each one works differently.

1. Booking.com: one name, several versions. When you create a template you can pick an additional language. Save every language version under the same template name: Booking matches the version to the guest's language preference and falls back to the default when there is none. Booking recommends English as the default unless most of your guests speak something else. A UK host adds French and German; a US host adds Portuguese and Spanish.
2. Airbnb: one version is enough. Airbnb auto-translates your messages, quick replies included, into the guest's language when they view them. Short sentences come through more reliably than long ones.
3. WhatsApp: ready versions as quick replies. The WhatsApp Business app has quick replies for messages you send often. Save the arrival message, directions and door code in each language you need, each under its own shortcut.
4. Reviews on Booking.com: the review's language or English. Replies in any other language are not published.
5. Back-translate before you save. Paste the translation back into the translator and turn it into English. If the meaning shifted, simplify the sentence and try again.
6. Write times twice. Most of Europe reads a 24-hour clock. „Check-in from 3 pm (15:00)” avoids a guest arriving at 3 am, or waiting until 15:00 for a door that opened at 3 pm.

A check-in message in English, German, French and Spanish

The same arrival-day message in four languages. Placeholders stay in English because you fill them in.

English

Hello {first name},
Thank you for your booking. Check-in from {time}, check-out by {time}.
Door code: {code}
Wi-Fi: {network}, password: {password}
If you have any questions, please message us here.
{your name}

German

Guten Tag,
vielen Dank für Ihre Buchung. Anreise ab {time}, Abreise bis {time}.
Türcode: {code}
WLAN: {network}, Passwort: {password}
Bei Fragen schreiben Sie uns bitte hier.
{your name}

French

Bonjour,
Merci pour votre réservation. Arrivée à partir de {time}, départ avant {time}.
Code d'accès : {code}
Wi-Fi : {network}, mot de passe : {password}
Pour toute question, écrivez-nous ici.
{your name}

Spanish

Hola:
Gracias por su reserva. Entrada a partir de las {time}, salida antes de las {time}.
Código de la puerta: {code}
Wi-Fi: {network}, contraseña: {password}
Para cualquier pregunta, escríbanos aquí.
{your name}

Where Supalobby fits

Supalobby's agent replies in the language the guest writes in, on every channel in the inbox: Booking.com, WhatsApp, Instagram, e-mail, the website chat, and for hosts in Poland also Slowhop and Aloha Camp. Polish, English, German and French are verified. Spanish, Korean and Italian are not on the verified list yet, so for those guests read the replies in Copilot mode before they go out. You write the property's knowledge base once and the agent answers from it in the guest's language, with no clipboard in between. On Airbnb it prepares a draft that you send with one click, and Airbnb translates it on its side anyway.