Booking and Expedia hold 85% of the European OTA market, while direct bookings still lead
Nova HOTREC study It shows how concentrated hotel distribution in Europe is within OTA channels. Booking Holdings and Expedia Group together account for 85.41% of OTA bookings, although more than half of the total hotel reservations it still goes directly to hotels.
More than every second hotel reservation in Europe during 2025 came through direct channels, but when a guest chooses an OTA channel, the choice in practice is heavily concentrated on two global groups. That is one of the main findings of the European Hotel Distribution Study 2026, which HOTREC and HES-SO Valais-Wallis conducted on a sample of 2,713 hotels from 28 countries.
Booking Holdings convincingly ahead of the competition
Booking Holdings accounts for 68.81% of European OTA bookings, with Booking.com alone holding a 66.11% share. Expedia Group follows with 16.61%. Together they control 85.41% of OTA volume.
Meanwhile, Expedia has strengthened its position in recent years: its share rose from 12.5% in 2021 to 16.6% in 2025. It is particularly prominent among larger hotels, chains, urban and business-oriented properties. Booking.com remains stronger among smaller independent hotels and the leisure segment. Across the ten hotel chains covered by additional data, Booking Holdings and Expedia together account for nearly 94% of OTA bookings.
Direct sales remains the largest channel
Despite the strength of the platforms, 51.31% of bookings in 2025 were made directly via hotel websites, email, telephone or other owned channels. OTA bookings accounted for 29.91%, while all online intermediaries combined, including GDS and social media, reached 32.31%.
The long-term trend nonetheless favours online intermediation. The share of OTA channels rose from 19.71% in 2013 to almost 30.1% in 2025, while the share of direct bookings fell from 57.61% to 51.31% over the same period.
Hotels are reporting problems with price control
For hoteliers, the problem is not just the commission. As many as 51% of the hotels surveyed state that OTA platforms often or occasionally offer a price lower than the one the hotel advertises itself. In a previous survey for 2023, this share was 43%. Among the hotels that answered a follow-up question, 80% state that such a price reduction was not agreed upon.
Already 44% of hotels report multi-sourcing, meaning the redistribution of prices and availability through other platforms or intermediaries. The consequences can include different prices for the same product, billing issues and poorer inventory control.
So, the direct channel still has a sufficiently large share to justify investments in our own booking engine, CRM and metasearch, but OTA platforms remain indispensable for international reach. The bigger challenge is therefore not completely reducing OTA sales, but retaining control over prices, guest data and distribution.
