Smoobu vs Lodgify: which one actually costs less on direct bookings
Smoobu and Lodgify both bundle a channel manager, a booking website, and a booking engine, and both take a cut of the direct bookings you win on their cheaper plans. Smoobu charges 0.9% on its Flex plan and nothing on Prepaid. Lodgify charges 1.9% on Starter and Professional, and nothing on Ultimate. That fee, not the sticker price, is usually what decides which is cheaper for you.
The short answer
Pick Smoobu
Pick Smoobu if you want the lower committed price and you are happy paying per unit. Its Prepaid plan removes the booking fee entirely at a price close to what Lodgify charges before adding one, and every Smoobu plan includes the channel manager, booking engine, and website rather than tiering them.
Pick Lodgify
Pick Lodgify if the website builder is the point. Lodgify is the stronger site builder of the two and its entry price is the lowest sticker in the category, which suits a host who wants a good-looking booking site quickly and does not yet take enough direct bookings for a 1.9% fee to matter.
Pick neither
Pick neither if you already have a website you like. Both are full platforms that expect to become your booking site, and you are paying for a channel manager, a site builder, and an engine to get one thing on the page you already run. If what you actually want is live availability and a direct booking form on an existing site, that is a much smaller purchase.
Smoobu vs Lodgify, side by side
Published plan details for both vendors, with RentalBeam shown for context. Checked August 21, 2026.
Fee on your direct bookings
Smoobu
Lodgify
RentalBeam
(us)
Entry price
Smoobu
Lodgify
RentalBeam
(us)
Permanent free plan
Smoobu
Lodgify
RentalBeam
(us)
Free trial
Smoobu
Lodgify
RentalBeam
(us)
Channel manager
Smoobu
Lodgify
RentalBeam
(us)
Website builder
Smoobu
Lodgify
RentalBeam
(us)
Works on your existing website
Smoobu
Lodgify
RentalBeam
(us)
iCal sync with Airbnb, Vrbo, Booking.com
Smoobu
Lodgify
RentalBeam
(us)
Mobile apps
Smoobu
Lodgify
RentalBeam
(us)
Priced per property
Smoobu
Lodgify
RentalBeam
(us)
| Feature | Smoobu | Lodgify | RentalBeam(us) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Fee on your direct bookings | 0.9% (Flex), 0% (Prepaid) | 1.9% (Starter, Professional), 0% (Ultimate) | None |
| Entry price | €29/mo per unit (Flex) | $16/mo billed annually | Free plan |
| Permanent free plan | Not included | Not included | Included |
| Free trial | 14 days, no card | Varies | Included |
| Channel manager | Included | Included | Not included |
| Website builder | Included | Included | Not included |
| Works on your existing website | Varies | Varies | Included |
| iCal sync with Airbnb, Vrbo, Booking.com | Included | Included | Included |
| Mobile apps | Included | Varies | Not included |
| Priced per property | Included | Varies | Not included |
Which is cheaper, Smoobu or Lodgify?
Lodgify is cheaper on the sticker and often more expensive in practice. Its entry plan costs less per month than Smoobu's, as the table above shows, but it adds a larger fee to every direct reservation on its cheaper plans, while Smoobu's fee is smaller and its prepaid plan carries none.
The crossover depends entirely on how much direct business you actually do. Lodgify's fee-free tier costs a good deal more per month than its entry plan, and the booking fee only overtakes that difference once direct bookings reach the tens of thousands a year. Below that the fee is cheaper than upgrading; above it the upgrade pays for itself.
Run the same arithmetic on your own numbers before choosing. Neither vendor puts the booking fee next to the headline price, and for a host doing real direct volume it is the larger of the two costs.
Does Smoobu or Lodgify charge commission on direct bookings?
Both do, on their cheaper plans, and both drop it on a dearer plan; the table above has the rates checked on the date shown. These are separate from the card-processing fee your payment provider charges, which you pay in every case.
This surprises hosts who moved to direct booking specifically to stop paying commission. It is much smaller than an OTA cut, which typically runs 3% to 15% or more, but it is not zero, and it scales with your success rather than staying flat.
Do you need either of them if you already have a website?
Often not. Smoobu and Lodgify are both platforms built around the assumption that they will host your booking website, and most of what you pay for is channel management and site building. A host who already has a site on Wix, Squarespace, WordPress, and Webflow and just wants guests to see live availability and send a booking request is buying a lot of platform to solve a small problem.
The lighter route is an embedded widget: a calendar that pulls your blocked dates in over iCal from Airbnb, Vrbo, and Booking.com, and a booking form beneath it. RentalBeam does exactly that, refreshing imported availability at most every 15 minutes, and takes no commission and no booking fee on direct bookings. The only booking cost is the standard card-processing fee, paid to Stripe rather than to us.
It is genuinely not the right answer for everyone. If you need a channel manager pushing rates and availability out to the OTAs over API, or you want a new booking website built for you, buy one of the two platforms above. RentalBeam is neither of those things.
Work out your own number
Percentage fees only matter in proportion to what you book directly, so the honest comparison is the one run on your own figures rather than anyone's example. Calculate what commissions cost you per year.
Sources
- Smoobu pricing page
- Lodgify pricing page
Smoobu and Lodgify are trademarks of their respective owners and are not affiliated with RentalBeam. RentalBeam makes a competing product, which is why it appears in the table above and is labelled as ours. Plan details were checked on August 21, 2026 and vendors change pricing without notice, so treat the figures as a snapshot rather than a quote. Where published sources disagree about a vendor's terms, the table marks the row as varying rather than guessing.
