How much does an Airbnb earn in EdinburghHow much does an Airbnb earn in Edinburgh? The honest numbers.
Owners on our standard fee kept 51% to 60% of what guests paid on real summer 2026 statements, before running costs. Here's how to work out what your own home could earn, and what comes off along the way.
How much does an Airbnb earn in Edinburgh? The short answer
A well-run two-bedroom Airbnb in a central part of Edinburgh can take tens of thousands of pounds a year from guests. One two-bedroom home near Easter Road that sleeps five took £66,000 in gross booking revenue in a year. That is a real result from a home we manage, and it is a good one, not an average. It is also gross: it is before platform fees, cleaning, the Visitor Levy and our fee.
The more useful question is what you keep. On real owner statements from summer 2026, owners on our standard fee kept 51% to 60% of what guests paid. That share is after platform fees, cleaning and our fee, and before your own running costs, such as energy, broadband, insurance and the licence. So when someone quotes you a big gross figure, roughly halve it before you start planning, then take your running costs and tax off that.
Three things decide most of the gap between a modest year and a strong one:
- Price. What similar homes list at in your area, for your number of bedrooms. Our Airbnb management page shows typical listed prices for 15 areas.
- Nights booked. Homes we manage all year were booked 84% of nights last year, against 72% for Edinburgh short lets overall (PriceLabs).
- Costs. Platform fees, cleaning, management, the licence, council tax or business rates, and tax.
For a range straight away, our Airbnb income calculator for Edinburgh gives one for your area and size in under a minute.
Airbnb income in Edinburgh starts with listed prices
Every honest estimate starts with what homes like yours ask for a night. The table below shows the median listed nightly price for a two-bedroom home over the next 12 months in a handful of areas. These are listed prices from PriceLabs, September 2026, not guaranteed earnings. Guests don't always pay the full listed price, and a listed night isn't a booked night.
| Area | 2-bedroom, median listed price a night |
|---|---|
| Old Town | £224 |
| Abbeyhill and Easter Road | £224 |
| New Town | £269 |
| Southside and Newington | £237 |
| Tollcross and West End | £260 |
| Leith and Newhaven | £201 |
| North Berwick | £196 |
How to read it:
- It's a median. Half the similar homes list above it and half below. A bright, well-photographed flat with good reviews sits towards the top. A tired one with a steep stair and no lift sits lower.
- It's an average across the year. August and Hogmanay list far above it. A wet Tuesday in February lists well below.
- Bedrooms and sleeps matter more than postcode. A home that sleeps five takes groups and families that a one-bedroom flat can't.
- North Berwick is in East Lothian. Guests there don't pay the Edinburgh Visitor Levy, so the price they see is lower for the same nightly rate.
For one-bedroom to five-bedroom prices in all 15 areas we cover, see the area table on our Airbnb management in Edinburgh page. If your street sits between two areas, choose the nearer one in the earnings calculator, or ask for a free plan and we'll use the homes closest to yours.
Short-let earnings in Edinburgh depend on nights booked
Price gets the attention, but nights booked usually decide the year. The difference between 72% and 84% of nights is about 44 extra nights a year. On a two-bedroom home that is a lot of income, and it costs almost nothing extra to earn beyond cleaning.
Across Edinburgh short lets overall, 72% of nights were booked (PriceLabs). The homes we managed all year were booked 84% of nights last year. We don't claim every home will match that.
Where empty nights come from
- One price all year. Too cheap in August, too dear in November. Two well-reviewed flats in Newington went from £2,465 to £10,380 a month in booking revenue once each night was priced on its own merits. That's one month, not a year, but it shows how much a flat price leaves behind.
- Gaps between stays. A two-night hole between bookings rarely fills on its own. Minimum-stay rules that change with the calendar fix most of them.
- Slow replies. Guests book the home that answers first. Ours are answered 9am to midnight, with an emergency line 24/7.
- Reviews and photos. A handful of weak reviews can cost more nights than any price change.
If you host yourself and want to see where your own nights go, our free Airbnb listing review gives you a person's honest view of what's holding bookings back. If you already have a manager and the numbers feel flat, our page on switching manager explains how a second opinion works. And for owners juggling it all, hosting it yourself covers what you can hand over and what you can keep.
Edinburgh seasons: why August is not a typical month
Edinburgh has one of the most uneven calendars in the UK. About a third of a year's income can arrive in six weeks of August, when the Fringe, the International Festival and the Tattoo fill the city. That is the ceiling, not the norm. If you plan your mortgage around an August month, the rest of the year will disappoint you.
Across our homes, winter months earn roughly a third to a half of summer months. The pattern most owners see looks like this:
- August. The peak, by a distance. Prices and nights booked both run far above the rest of the year. See our Fringe host's guide for what it takes.
- Hogmanay. A short, sharp peak over New Year, usually with minimum stays.
- Spring and early summer. City breaks, weddings and graduation weeks keep central homes busy from April to July.
- Rugby weekends. Six Nations weekends at Murrayfield fill homes across the city. See the 2027 Six Nations for hosts.
- November to March, outside the holidays. The quiet stretch. Midweek stays from visiting professionals and contractors help, at lower prices.
So judge a short let on a full year, never on one summer month, and keep a cushion. Your mortgage, factor fees and energy bills arrive in January as surely as in August. The income doesn't. A good plan shows you the year month by month, so the quiet months are no surprise. That's what our free short-let plan sets out for your home.
From what guests pay to what you keep
Here's the honest chain from a guest's payment to your bank account.
- What guests pay. The nightly price times the nights booked, plus any cleaning fee shown to guests.
- Platform fees. Airbnb, Booking.com and the other sites take a share of each booking. It varies by platform and by how the listing is set up, so check your own payouts rather than a headline rate.
- The Visitor Levy. From 24 July 2026, stays in the City of Edinburgh carry a 5% levy on the accommodation price for the first five nights. The guest pays it and it goes to the council, so it isn't your income. Strip it out of any "guests paid" figure before you compare. Our Visitor Levy guide for hosts has the dates and a worked example. East Lothian homes don't pay it.
- Cleaning and linen. A clean after every stay. Short stays mean more cleans, which is one reason minimum stays matter.
- Management. If you use a manager. Ours is from 15% + VAT of net booking revenue for one to four homes, which is 18% including VAT, not 15%. Net booking revenue is what guests paid after platform fees, cleaning and the Visitor Levy. Every tier is on our pricing page, with a calculator that works it out exactly as your statement does.
That gets you to the 51% to 60% owners kept on our summer 2026 statements. After that come your own running costs and tax, covered further down.
Two things soften the first year. New owners who sign a one-year agreement by 31 December 2026 pay 10% + VAT for their first four months, on every tier. Against that, there's a one-off onboarding fee: £400 + VAT for a studio, one or two bedrooms, which covers the listing, pricing setup, a compliance check and the first clean.
How much does an Airbnb earn in Edinburgh after costs? A worked example
This is an illustration, not a forecast, and not a figure for any real home. It uses round numbers so you can follow every line and swap in your own. The assumptions: a two-bedroom flat, an average price actually paid of £200 a night across the year, platform fees of 17%, stays of three nights on average, £100 a clean, and our standard fee of 15% + VAT. We show it at 72% and 84% of nights booked.
| Illustration | 72% booked | 84% booked |
|---|---|---|
| Nights booked in a year | 263 | 307 |
| Guests pay for the nights, at £200 | £52,600 | £61,400 |
| Visitor Levy (5%), collected and paid to the council | £2,630 in, £2,630 out | £3,070 in, £3,070 out |
| Platform fees at 17% | − £8,942 | − £10,438 |
| Cleaning, 88 and 102 stays at £100 | − £8,800 | − £10,200 |
| Net booking revenue | £34,858 | £40,762 |
| Management at 18% including VAT | − £6,274 | − £7,337 |
| Yours, before running costs and tax | £28,584 | £33,425 |
| Share of what guests paid for the nights | 54% | 54% |
Three things are worth seeing here. The share you keep lands inside the 51% to 60% range from real statements, which is a useful check on any estimate. The extra 44 nights add almost £5,000 to what you keep, which is why nights booked matter as much as price. And the levy changes nothing for you: it passes through.
What the illustration leaves out: the onboarding fee and the lower new-owner rate in year one, any cleaning fee charged to guests, and the running costs and tax in the next section.
To try your own area and size, use the Edinburgh Airbnb income calculator. For a month-by-month version built from homes like yours on your street, with every cost, ask for a free plan.
Running costs, council tax, the licence and tax
Everything above is before your own costs. They differ a lot from home to home, so we don't put a number on them, but here is the list to price for yours.
Running costs
- Energy, water where it applies, and broadband. Guests use more heating than you might expect in an Edinburgh winter.
- Insurance written for short lets, not a standard home policy.
- Factor fees and shared repairs to the stair, roof and close.
- Maintenance and replacements: towels, bedding, the kettle, the odd sofa.
- Mortgage interest, if there is a mortgage.
Council tax or business rates
In Scotland, a self-catering home moves onto business rates only if it was available to let for 140 days in the year and actually let for 70. Otherwise it stays on council tax. Our page on council tax or business rates for short lets explains the test and the evidence to keep. This matters more from 1 January 2027, when Edinburgh's premium on second homes rises from 100% to 300%: see our post on the council tax premium.
The licence
Every short let in Scotland has needed a licence since 1 October 2023, and the council fee depends on the licence type and how many guests the home sleeps. Add the certificates: gas safety, electrical checks, fire safety and an EPC. Our licence costs page lists every fee, and how short-term let licensing works explains which licence you need.
Tax
The special tax rules for furnished holiday lets ended in April 2025, so short-let profits are now taxed like other rental income. What you pay depends on your other income, so speak to your accountant. Our short-let tax guide covers the basics, and we give every owner a clear yearly summary to help.
What makes one Edinburgh short let earn more than another
Two flats on the same street can have very different years. Location sets the ceiling, but most of the difference comes from things an owner can change.
- How many it sleeps. A two-bedroom home that sleeps five can take families and small groups. Groups struggle to find space near the centre and pay for it.
- Photos and the listing. Guests choose on the first photo, before they read a word.
- Reviews. Cleanliness and clear check-in instructions drive most review scores. A run of good reviews lifts both price and nights booked.
- The stair and the neighbours. Tenement stairs, communal bins and narrow closes are part of Edinburgh. Clear house rules and a calm stair protect your reviews and your licence. Our guide to short-letting a tenement flat has the detail.
- Pricing every night. Festivals, rugby, graduations and quiet midweeks each need their own price. One rate all year is the most common reason a good home underearns.
Your licence route affects the sums
If the flat is your main home and you let it while you're away, you need a home letting licence, and you can only let it while you're not living there. If it's a whole home you don't live in, the whole of Edinburgh is a short-term let control area, so you'll need planning permission for secondary letting as well as a licence. Planning can take time and isn't guaranteed, so check it before you count on a full year of income.
Some owners find a long let pays better once everything is counted. That's a perfectly good answer. Our guide Short let or long let? The Edinburgh numbers sets the two side by side.
How to get an honest Airbnb income estimate for your home
Here's the method we'd use if we were in your shoes.
- Find your listed price. Look up your area and bedrooms on our Airbnb management page. Knock a little off, because guests don't always pay the full listed price.
- Choose a sensible occupancy. Start at 72%, the Edinburgh average. Only use a higher figure if you have a track record or a manager with one.
- Multiply, then take off platform fees and cleaning. Leave the levy out: it passes straight through to the council.
- Take off management. At 15% + VAT, use 18% of net booking revenue, not 15%.
- Check the result against 51% to 60%. If you're keeping much more than that share of what guests pay, something is missing.
- List your running costs. Insurance, energy, broadband, factor fees, council tax or business rates, the licence and upkeep.
- Set aside tax. Then look at the year month by month, so you know what January looks like.
Or let us do it. The earnings calculator gives you a range now. For the full picture, tell us about your home in about five minutes and we'll send a plan by 11am the next working day: what it could earn on your dates, the licence route and every cost. Free, and with no obligation. If you'd rather talk it through, book a 15-minute call with one of the co-founders.
By the Stays In team, Edinburgh. General guidance, not legal or financial advice.
