How much does a hotel booking website cost per month?

It depends entirely on what is bundled: some prices cover only the site, with the booking engine and a per-booking fee charged separately. The comparable number is the total of all five lines at your real booking volume — a low monthly price with a percentage per booking can cost far more than a higher flat one.

Is a free hotel website good enough to take bookings?

It can be, provided it genuinely takes the booking rather than only displaying rooms, and provided the free tier isn't paid for with a per-booking cut. Check what happens at the moment a guest wants to confirm and pay — that is where free plans usually stop.

What does PeakRooms cost?

Starter is free forever, Pro is $19 a month and Growth is $39 a month, and every plan is 0% commission on bookings — the only other cost is your own payment provider's standard card fee when a guest pays by card. The full breakdown is on the pricing page.

Do I still need OTAs if I have my own booking website?

Most independent properties keep both. OTAs buy reach you can't match alone; the direct channel converts the guests who would rather book with you, including the ones who found you on an OTA and then searched your name. The goal is shifting the mix, not switching it off.

How do I work out whether it pays for itself?

Take your monthly revenue through OTAs, multiply by the commission rate you pay, and compare a single month of that against a year of the website's cost. For most independent properties the website costs less than one month of commission — the free commission calculator does the arithmetic on your own numbers.

What a hotel booking website costs

1. The website itself

Two shapes, with very different risk. A bespoke build from an agency is a one-off cost that varies enormously by market and scope, and it still needs someone to maintain it afterwards — the second year is rarely free. A subscription product is a predictable monthly line with updates and hosting included. For a property under about thirty rooms, predictability usually matters more than bespoke design, because the money saved goes straight into rooms and marketing.

2. The booking engine

A website that only shows rooms isn't a booking website. The engine — the part that holds availability, takes the reservation and confirms it — is frequently sold separately from the site, and that separation is where surprise costs live. Ask whether it is included, whether it is a per-property or per-room price, and whether it is capped.

3. Commission or per-booking fees

This is the line that decides everything else, because it scales with your success rather than sitting flat. A booking engine charging a percentage of each direct reservation is a smaller OTA: it costs nothing while you're quiet and takes a growing share exactly as the direct channel starts to work. A flat subscription with no per-booking cut behaves the opposite way — the better the channel does, the cheaper it gets per booking.

4. Card processing

If guests pay by card, your payment provider takes its standard fee. That is unavoidable and it is the provider's fee, not the website's — so what matters is whether the booking tool adds a markup on top of it, and whether the money lands in your own account or is held by the vendor first. Money that goes straight to your provider is both cheaper and safer.

5. The domain name

The smallest line on the list: an annual registration for the address guests type. Worth owning outright and in your own name rather than through a vendor, so it stays yours if you ever change tools.

6. The cost of not having one

The five lines above are what a direct channel costs. What it saves is the commission on every booking it moves off an OTA — commonly 15–20% of the stay for an independent property. That comparison, not the sticker price, is the real arithmetic: a website is worth its cost the moment it shifts a handful of bookings a month away from a commission channel.

Ask any booking-website vendor these five questions

Do you take a commission or a fee on each booking my own website takes?
Is the booking engine included in that price, or a separate product?
Does the guest's card payment go to my payment provider, or to you first?
Do you add anything on top of my provider's standard card fee?
If I leave, do I keep my domain, my content, and my guest details?

Key takeaways

Price the whole channel — site, engine, per-booking fee, card processing, domain.
A per-booking cut on your own direct bookings is a smaller OTA in disguise.
Card fees belong to your payment provider; a markup on them is a vendor choice.
Own the domain in your own name so the address stays yours.
Compare the total against the OTA commission it replaces, not against zero.

What a hotel booking website really costs