Here's how Google is making booking your next hotel easier
Searching for hotels on Google just got a lot easier. The search engine announced on Jan. 8 that it is adding a slew of new features on Google Hotel Search aimed at helping travelers pick the best hotels for trips.
Here's what that means for your next trip.
The Google Travel site will now show you the best times to visit and typical hotel prices for your dates of travel. A new tab will show how weather, crowds and pricing vary across the year.
One of the hardest things I encounter when picking a hotel is what neighborhood I want to be in. Sometimes, I want to be in an area where there's a ton of good bars and restaurants. Other times I want to be close to public transit. And other times, I want to be as far as possible from the action because I want a good night's sleep.
Related: Google Releases New Flight and Hotel Search Features
Google's new "Where to stay" feature will now give you a summary of top neighborhoods. It will tell you what each area is known for, its location score, and the average cost of hotels in that neighborhood.
Google will also alert you if you've stayed previously at a hotel or if you've searched for a hotel before and will include more personalized results. For instance, if you've searched for fun things to do near the National Mall in Washington, D.C., Google Travel will now show you hotels close to that destination.
If you've ever found a fabulous, cheap hotel and then were surprised that it wasn't the same price at checkout, Google now has a solution for that. The platform is making it more transparent in how much you'll pay for your whole stay by showing both the nightly price and the total price, including taxes and fees.
Finally, the search engine also released its list of the top ten trending travel destinations for 2020 based on hotel searches.
Related: We're calling it now: The 20 hottest travel destinations of 2020
What destination topped the list? Da Nang, Vietnam (DAD). While no U.S. destinations made the list: several TPG favorites cracked the top ten, including Tel Aviv (TLV), Tokyo (HND/NRT) and Perth (PER).
If you've been Google searching some of these destinations, you have plenty of points and miles options to plan your next trip. For instance, Perth, which number 10 on the list has several points hotels to choose from. The Ritz-Carlton Perth is a Category 7 property, with award nights costing 50,000 points apiece at off-peak times, 60,000 points at standard rates, or 70,000 points at peak pricing. And if you're looking for flights, you have plenty of options with Qantas or Virgin Australia.
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