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Airbnb was powered by the solar eclipse in its first quarter, reporting record bookings from travelers viewing the celestial event.
“We had our best Q1 ever,” said Brian Chesky, Airbnb’s CEO during the company’s earnings call on Wednesday. “I’m proud of our strong Q1 results and look forward to another record summer travel season.”
Over 500,000 guests booked stays on Airbnb during the eclipse.
The better-than-expected first quarter earnings were also driven by continued strength in travel demand and the timing of Easter, the company said. Moreover, Airbnb’s nights and experiences reached 133 million bookings, a 9.5% increase when compared to the same period last year, driven by growth in all regions.
Travelers may be powering Airbnb’s nights and experiences, but they didn’t keep shares of Airbnb from falling by 7% in after hours, trading at $146.
For the first quarter, Airbnb generated revenue of $2.14 billion, about $0.41 cents a share. Analysts expected it would report $2.06 billion, about $0.24 cents a share.
Chesky also said during the earnings call that the company is seeing growth in its app downloads and usage from customers in the Asia Pacific and Latin America regions.
“I could argue that Airbnb might resonate better in Asia because there’s the younger travel population that’s not predisposed to hotels and they’re on social media,” he said. Meanwhile, in the U.S., Airbnb’s app downloads during the first quarter increased 60%.
The online travel booking company beat Wall Street’s expectations, but warned of weaker guidance for its second quarter.
Airbnb said it expects revenue during the second quarter to be between $2.68 billion to $2.74 billion. That revenue growth outlook will be impacted due to do “significant sequential headwinds” including the timing of the Easter holiday, Leap Day during the first quarter, and the impact of FX rate changes, the company said.
Airbnb said it is already experiencing “robust demand for travel around international events” including the Summer 2024 Olympics in Paris and the Euro Cup.
“These events highlight Airbnb’s unique ability to disperse travel and spread economic benefits by allowing people to stay in local neighborhoods where there are no hotels,” Airbnb’s Chesky said.
Airbnb said that the strength in its summer backlog, which it expects to drive year-over-year growth, will accelerate during the third quarter.
Separately, Airbnb compared its latest “Icons” experience to Apple’s iPod, noting that at some point a company must evolve to meet the changing demand of consumers.