
AirBnb's new site design - raheemm
https://www.airbnb.com/
======
ZanderEarth32
To be honest, I never had any interest in trying AirBnB services. I never saw
the allure of staying in someone else's rundown apartment or guest bedroom. I
mean who wants to be that stranger in the other room? THAT SAID, this website
did change my mind a little bit. I still don't think I'd like to stay in
someone else's home but this website has demonstrated that there are some
really amazing places you can stay in for very low costs. If I could get over
my own hangups about being in other people's home, I'd definitely give AirBnB
a shot after visiting this website.

It comes off as a luxury hotel website, or one of those 'ooh la la' HGTV tv
shows where they show you cool, abstract homes you'll never live in. This is a
good thing.

To the topic of site speed, is it really an issue to non-web-geeks? Do normal
users of the web really know what a slow website is? Anyone know of studies or
stats on what an average internet user considers is a slow page?

UPDATED

The website has done a good enough job of convincing me this is a legit
service where it's customers are happy. I've decided to give AirBnB a shot.
Going to plan a trip utilizing their services this evening. Wish me luck.

~~~
dmix
> I mean who wants to be that stranger in the other room?

It feels just like a hotel. You usually get towels and your own separate room.

Usually you're travelling so you don't really spend much time there unless
you're sleeping.

I stayed in the lower east side for only $50/night, so its definitely worth
it.

~~~
ZanderEarth32
I agree, I am not usually in my hotel room very often if I am on vacation but
that raises the point of, if I am hardly in the room, who cares where I stay?
I know this flies in the face of my point of being hung up on being in other
peoples homes, but why not just stay in a cheaper motel (if available)?

To be honest, I'd really like to try it one day. Some of those locations look
great and the prices are very reasonable.

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EnderMB
When I see heavy web pages like this it makes me worry about the state of
front-end web design.

According to YSlow, the site came to 3.5MB, which is quite large when compared
to the average home page. The site took at least five seconds to load on my
fast dev machine, which is far too long.

The nail in the coffin for me, however, is that this site does not work in
older browser, namely IE7. I've worked with large clients and we've made sure
that everything works in IE6 and above because they make the cost back from
sales within hours. A large company like airbnb simply cannot afford to not
support older browsers and I firmly believe that they'll lose a ton on money
on their lack of support.

All in all, I'm disappointed.

~~~
untog
It loaded for me in ~2 seconds, on a 2010 Macbook Air. I think we're at the
stage where 'heavy' pages are permissible, and even advantageous at times.

~~~
bengillies
It loaded for me in ~30 seconds on a 2011 Macbook Pro. I don't see what your
loading experience has to do with anything. Different people have different
connection speeds in different parts of the world (my connection speed varies
within the same building depending on congestion, etc).

That said, all the fancy pictures do look very nice, and certainly draw you in
like no other travel site that I've come across (when it eventually loads).

~~~
untog
_I don't see what your loading experience has to do with anything._

I was responding to anecdotal evidence with contrary anecdotal evidence. In
the big scheme of things neither really means anything, but it would be pretty
tedious if I had to test a statistically significant number of machines every
time I altered a page layout.

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baby
Ughh, I really don't like it. I felt lost right away. I use to think about
Airbnb's design a lot when designing on my own because it was simple and told
you directly what you wanted. Like dropbox for example. I don't get the
complication here.

PS: This should be #1 on HN...

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kiwidrew
As an Airbnb host, I'm worried that this new homepage has too much going on.
The old design really emphasized the "Where are you going?" search box, which
led quite naturally on to the listing results page. Also, many of my guests
are making bookings on-the-go in countries with less than ideal internet
connectivity. So page size definitely matters, and 3.5MB is pushing the
limits.

I do really like how the check-in/check-out date widgets slide out from the
search box when you click it, though... makes the interface feel responsive
and de-clutters the search box.

Luckily, the rest of the site hasn't been touched other than to add the "Wish
Lists" feature (which I like so far).

------
jermaink
Dear Airbnb team and design crew, you did a great job! The landing page is
great and I´ve always been waiting for the infinite scroll solution for your
service you implemented right now. Especially I really like the Picks and
Collections which have their own style and a cool font. Is your designer
featured on dribbble? For sure, these images are becoming the "Google Doodles"
of airbnb.

I think the whole website looks nice & furnished right now and underlines the
community culture. Maybe you can still tune the city listings page a little?
They grey containers right here <http://www.airbnb.com/s/San-Francisco--CA>
could be improved.

@airbnb: do you plan to offer the "Wish List" in combination with a gifting
function, so that a user can gift his girlfriend or whomever with X nights in
Wish List place younameit? I think if you integrate that into Facebook "X just
gifted Y with Z nights in this beautiful room (link) in City Awesome", it
would be nice.

~~~
mschaecher
Kelli Anderson did most the visual graphics in Airbnb Picks:
<http://dribbble.com/kellianderson>

------
plusbryan
I love the new wishlists and how you're featuring people's lists on the home
page. Probably a nice lightweight way to get people engaged with the site.

Some feedback - when I'm on a wishlist, it's actually pretty difficult to
navigate to the listings themselves. I click the listing name and see a pop up
that really only has one call to action - the "Save to Wish list" button. The
listing name links just link you back to the wish list - in fact, the only way
to actually view the real listing is to click the price tag. Maybe I'm missing
something, but if I see a listing that looks interesting, I'd like to be able
to view the listing and possibly book it.

~~~
picasso81
You're right, increasing engagement is a goal here. Regarding your feedback,
under the Wish List button is the location, map, and 'Book it' link. All three
take you to the listing. Keep the feedback coming.

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kcodey
This makes me think that their "supply side" is fully stocked and that they
really just need people to book nights on existing inventory. Kind of seems
like they are neglecting the supply side and focusing on the demand right now,
by putting the "list your space" all the way in the top right with a small
box.

~~~
kiwidrew
Definitely the case. They've put a lot of effort into bringing on new hosts
this past year, to the point that I've noticed a distinct slowdown in bookings
recently. I'm all for Airbnb focusing on demand now. :)

------
Timothee
It looks nice but it also looks very busy.

One thing I will never understand though, is a design that includes infinite
scrolling _and_ a footer. I finally got to the footer because the refreshing
locked somehow, but it seems that it's just supposed to add more listings
forever.

------
raheemm
There new feature Wish List may have something to do with the redesign. More
here --> [http://blog.airbnb.com/hello-world-im-an-airbnb-wish-list-
yo...](http://blog.airbnb.com/hello-world-im-an-airbnb-wish-list-youll-love)

------
SkyMarshal
I love how the long-scrolling tiled design sucks you into exploring all their
offerings. So much easier to do that via scrolling than by clicking around
through the site.

Great use of two design concepts to remove barriers to and simplify the core
customer experience.

PS - the Frank Lloyd Wright collection, for anyone who missed it:

<https://www.airbnb.com/wishlists/frank-lloyd-wright>

Also, looks like Jack Dorsey is a fan of houseboats and the occasional mega-
yacht:

<https://www.airbnb.com/wishlists/3182046>

------
leftnode
This type of redesign is not needed. Full redesigns are rarely needed. In my
opinion, they should have spent several months changing small pieces of their
site and testing how well people respond to the changes.

------
sil3ntmac
My first thought (before clicking): Why would they redesign their site? Their
site, and all their related apps, look really wonderful.

After clicking: Still looks great, although now the landing page looks like
grooveshark :)

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mnicole
Yikes, it looks more like a Gilt/Fab site than something I'd feel comfortable
renting my place through. Resizing is a disaster, which is weird because this
site would be easy to media query up.

~~~
madoublet
I personally like the look of the site. I think it is a bit overdone, but
still visually pleasing. I completely agree with your resizing comment though.
In 2012, if you are going all out on a redesign, the site should be
responsive.

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rdl
I simultaneously dislike the design (too busy, too big, silverlight, moving,
etc.) and am more likely to use airbnb (because the great photography reveals
some awesome rentals, although usually far away places I'd be unlikely to go).
I wonder if that's what they were going for.

~~~
picasso81
Where are people getting silverlight from? There's no silverlight on the site.

~~~
rdl
Something pegs my CPU when I browse the site on Windows in IE, but not on OSX.
I have silverlight and flash on the windows browser but not on osx, so that's
what I assumed it was (based on someone else having mentioned silverlight); I
guess it's something else.

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abruzzi
Searching support is pretty broken. It seems to return lots of links that are
gone. For example, I searched "favorites" and the top two results (a page on
favorites and a page on wish lists) don't work. And they were the ones that
had the info I needed.

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RoyceFullerton
Next month's post: Wimdu's new site design <http://wimdu.com>

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jaems33
Beautiful design. I like how it focuses on the imagery (as it should) and once
again great typography.

------
jarnix
The first click on a link works, the second does not (tested on latest stable
Chrome).

~~~
zackbigdog
Same for me. It keeps freezing as well. I am pretty floored they they decided
to use silverlight... why?

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heyjonboy
It's a new homepage, not a new site. The profile pages are unchanged.

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dr_
Square Up is the url for Square's website. It should also now be used to
describe sites that outright copy it's style. "Hey, you go to www.abcdefg.com?
looks like they squared up!"

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denysonique
They seem to be using Backbone.js now

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mmilkin
This should also be called "Responsive design fail".

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Angostura
Hate it. It looks like some kind of interior design site than a site that
allows me find places to stay... or list my place. I scrolled down and down
hoping to find some meat, but no - just more glossy nonsense.

More importantly, I was about to list my place on the site. It's a nice
looking house in London, but no - it dose NOT look like something from an
interior design mag. Clearly my house does not meet the required standard.
Better not list it.

~~~
geoffw8
> It's a nice looking house in London, but no - it dose NOT look like
> something from an interior design mag. Clearly my house does not meet the
> required standard. Better not list it.

This is a fair point, I worry it might get lost in the first half of your
post!

~~~
Angostura
Agreed. It was a very testy post I shod just learn to avoid posting while in a
bad mood.

