Marketing
Airbnb Photography Tips: Twilight, Emotion and the First Five
By Jillian Mood5 min read
Nobody books a floor plan. They book the feeling of a fire pit at dusk, a coffee on the deck while mist lifts off the meadow, a sky full of stars they cannot see from the city. Accurate, well-lit photos get a listing considered. Photos with emotion get it chosen.
I shoot my own photography for the homes I manage, and this is how I think about it.
What the evidence says about photos
Photography is one of the few areas of hosting with real research behind it.
A Carnegie Mellon University study by Shunyuan Zhang, Dokyun Lee, Param Vir Singh and Kannan Srinivasan, summarized by the Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center, found that photos taken by Airbnb-verified professionals increased demand by about 7%, worth an average of $4,141 more per year for the hosts studied. The researchers used deep learning to trace more than half of that effect to measurable image qualities in three families: composition, color, and how the main subject stands out from its background. Much of that is learnable.
Airbnb's own pro photography program reports that listings with its professional photos see, on average, 21% higher earnings and 19% more bookings than other listings in their area. Airbnb is careful to say these are averages, not guaranteed results, and a comparison like this cannot separate the photos from everything else those hosts do well.
Get the fundamentals right first
Airbnb's guide to taking great listing photos covers the basics well:
- Shoot horizontally. Search results crop images to squares and the listing page displays landscape.
- Use soft natural light indoors, switch off the flash, and save exteriors for golden hour.
- Mix wide, mid-range and close-up images to show both the big picture and the little details.
- Upload high resolution (at least 1200 by 800 pixels), build the photo tour by room, and write captions that explain what the photo cannot show.
Then add emotion: five feelings I shoot for
1. The twilight exterior. For about twenty minutes after sunset, the sky turns deep blue or pink while the house still holds detail. Turn on every interior light, light the fire pit and the string lights, set the camera on a tripod and keep shooting as the sky changes. The windows glow, and the house looks like it is waiting for you.
2. The night sky. In the country, darkness is an amenity. A tripod, a wide lens, a long exposure and a moonless night can show guests the stars over the roofline.
3. The wild around the house. Guests rent the setting as much as the rooms: Mount Pinacle glowing orange at sunset, morning mist over the meadow, the reservoir across the road in Southborough, a forest trail.
4. Hygge. These are the cozy close-ups: two coffees on the deck table at sunrise, a branded mug in hand, fluffy robes, a board game mid-play, the welcome board with local charcuterie and bread.
5. Fun. A dog tearing across the meadow. A plush moose "looking" at the villa. Life in the frame helps a guest picture their own family there. If people appear in your photos, get their consent first. Often a hint of a person is enough: a hand, a mug, a pair of boots by the door.
Order matters: the first five
On a desktop listing page, guests see a cover photo and four more before they click into the full gallery. In search results, they see mostly the cover. So I cast those five deliberately:
- The hero. The single most emotional, recognizable image. Often the twilight exterior.
- The heart of the home. The great room or main living space, wide and bright.
- The signature feature. The thing no neighbor has: a library wall with more than 1,000 books, a conservatory, a mountain view.
- The best bedroom. Guests need to see where they will sleep, early.
- A lifestyle moment. The fire pit, the deck coffee, the dog in the meadow.
Kitchens, bathrooms, the remaining bedrooms and every practical detail follow, organized room by room in the photo tour. I go deeper on titles, descriptions and captions in how to write an Airbnb listing that books.
A shot list you can borrow
- Twilight exterior, front and garden side, lights and fire on
- Each living space, wide from a corner, at about chest height with vertical lines straight
- Every bedroom, bed freshly made, lamps on, caption with bed size
- Each amenity in use: projector on, grill open, games out
- Kitchen wide, plus one detail (ours: "kitchen and full spice rack :)")
- A seasonal set: repeat the exteriors in fall colour and in snow, then rotate the cover photo with the season
Honest is part of beautiful
Emotion never means misleading. Edit for brightness and color, not to erase the power line or stretch the room. Guests who arrive to exactly what they saw, in a slightly better mood than they expected, tend to be the ones who leave five stars.
Pro, DIY, or a partner
Many hosts take very good photos themselves. What a standard real estate shoot rarely includes is the patience part: coming back at dusk, waiting for mist, returning when the leaves turn. Because I work with a home through the seasons, I can catch those moments. It is part of what I do for the owners I work with, along with the listing, the pricing and the guests.
Sources
Want this done for your home?
Everything in this article is part of what Jillian does for the homes she hosts. Tell her about yours and she will tell you, honestly, what she would do with it.
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