What should be cleaned between Airbnb stays?

Airbnb's ground rules say a listing should be clean and free of health hazards before check-in. Hosts should clean between every stay, including laundry, trash, vacuuming or sweeping, and wiping surfaces. The room-by-room list on this page is a practical way to do that work.

Can I ask guests to strip the beds and take out the trash?

For reservations booked on or after November 20, 2026, Airbnb says hosts are generally not allowed to ask guests for tasks that take significant effort or that a cleaner would usually do, including stripping the bed, taking trash offsite, or washing and putting away dishes. Hosts should also not charge a fee or penalty because a guest skipped a specific cleaning task. The checklist on this page is work for the host or the cleaner.

Which supplies does Airbnb call essential?

Airbnb strongly encourages toilet paper, soap for hands and body, one towel per guest, one pillow per guest, and linens for each guest bed. If Essentials is selected and those items are not provided, Airbnb says the listing may face penalties, including removal.

How do I turn this turnover into a cleaning fee?

Enter the cleaner, laundry, supplies, and your time in the cleaning fee calculator, then read the guest total and host payout in the Airbnb fee calculator. How to set an Airbnb cleaning fee walks through Airbnb's flat cleaning fee and the service-fee base. The result is a planning estimate. It is not tax or legal advice, and it is not Airbnb's calculation for a reservation.

Airbnb turnover cleaning checklist

Clean between every stay, restock what the next guest needs, and check the door, the Wi-Fi, and the alarms before arrival. Then price that work before you save a cleaning fee.

The boxes are a working list for the host or the cleaner. For reservations booked on or after November 20, 2026, Airbnb says hosts are generally not allowed to ask guests to do work a cleaner would usually do, including stripping the bed, taking trash offsite, and washing and putting away dishes. The sources are under the list. This page is not legal, tax, or safety advice. Confirm the fire code and any other local rule where the property is.

Turnover checklist. Printed from bnbutils.com. Ticked boxes are a working copy on this sheet. They are not a saved record.

Turnover checklist

Kitchen

Dishes, food from the last stay, surfaces, the floor, and the bin.

Clear the sink. Wash the dishes, or run the dishwasher and empty it.
Wipe the counters, the stovetop, the microwave, and the table.
Check the fridge and the oven for spills and food the last guest left.
Empty the trash, wipe the bin if it needs it, and put in a new liner.
Sweep or vacuum, then wash the floor.
Put dirty dish towels and kitchen linens in the laundry.
Put cleaning products away, off the counters you just wiped.

Bathrooms

Every bathroom the next guest can use.

Clean the toilet, the sink, the mirror, and the shower or tub, including hair left behind.
Wash the floor.
Empty the trash and fit a new liner.
Set out one clean bath towel and a hand towel for each guest on the next booking.
Replace the toilet paper and the soap for hands and body.
Run the fan, or open the window, and confirm it works.

Bedrooms

Remake the beds the next guest will sleep in. Leave the others closed off if the listing says they are unavailable.

Strip the sheets, pillowcases, and duvet covers from beds the last guest used.
Remake each guest bed with clean linens.
Put a clean case on one pillow per guest on the next booking.
Check under the beds, in the drawers, and in the closet for anything left behind.
Wipe the nightstands and the switches.
Vacuum or sweep.

Living areas

Include a dining area that is not part of the kitchen.

Remove trash, dishes, and anything the last guest left.
Wipe the tables, the remotes, and the switches.
Vacuum or sweep, including the edges you can reach.
Straighten the seating.
If a pet stayed, go over the floors and the upholstery for hair.

Laundry, trash, and entry

The clean is not finished while linens and trash are still in the guest space.

Wash and dry the linens from this stay, or bag them for the laundry service you use.
Keep a clean spare set of sheets and towels when the laundry will not be back before the next arrival.
Take the trash out of the home to the place it is actually collected.
Replace the bags you used.
Vacuum the hallway and any stairs the guest will use.
Walk the entry and any patio, balcony, or parking spot the guest is allowed to use, and remove trash.

Restock

The first five lines are the items Airbnb's essentials page names. The last two keep the next clean possible.

Toilet paper in each bathroom the guest will use.
Soap for hands and soap for body.
One towel per guest on the next booking. If that stay is not booked yet, stock the capacity you list.
One pillow per guest, on the same basis.
Linens on each guest bed.
Dish soap, a sponge, and trash bags for the next stay.
Only the extra starter items the listing promises, such as coffee, and none you have not listed.

Before the guest arrives

Do this after the rooms are clean. A made bed does not fix a dead code or a wrong password.

No dirty dishes, no extensive dust, and no mold or pest problem you can see.
Smoke alarm tested, working, and matching what the listing says is installed.
Carbon monoxide alarm tested and working, or the listing records the exception that actually applies.
The entry code or key for this booking works, and it is not the previous guest's code.
Check-in instructions name the door the guest will use.
If the listing includes Wi-Fi, a phone joins with the name and password in those instructions.
Hot water runs. Heat or cooling does what the listing describes.
The lights the guest needs on arrival work.
The calendar leaves enough time after checkout for this turnover.

What Airbnb says to do between stays

Airbnb’s ground rules for homes say a listing should be clean and free of health hazards before check-in. The page names mold and pests. It says hosts should provide a high standard of cleanliness, and it gives extensive dust, pet dander, and dirty dishes as examples of what that standard excludes. It also says hosts should clean between every stay: do laundry, take out trash, vacuum or sweep, and wipe down surfaces.

The room list above is a way to cover those jobs in a typical home. It is a host checklist. It is not a second Airbnb policy, and it does not add tasks the help page does not mention, such as a required brand of cleaner or a required wait time. If a room on the list is not part of the listing, skip it.

The same ground rules say the amenities on the listing should be available from check-in to checkout. If you list a kitchen, a washer, or Wi-Fi, the turnover includes leaving that amenity usable. Restrictions, such as a pool that is closed for the season, belong on the listing.

Airbnb’s essentials page strongly encourages five items in every listing: toilet paper, soap for hands and body, one towel per guest, one pillow per guest, and linens for each guest bed. It says you can offer more for a larger group or a longer stay. If you select Essentials and those items are not actually there, the page says the listing may face penalties, including removal from Airbnb. The restock boxes follow that list. Coffee, oil, and snacks are on the list only when the listing promises them.

Getting started as a host suggests keeping extra sheets and towels so you are not waiting on laundry, and leaving enough preparation time between reservations. Those two lines are on the checklist for that reason. The same page says check-in instructions should include the Wi-Fi password, along with contact information and the house rules that are already on the listing.

Alarms, the door code, and the next arrival

Smoke and carbon monoxide alarms: Airbnb strongly urges hosts to install smoke and carbon monoxide alarms in spaces that use fuel-burning appliances, to test them regularly, and to keep the listing description current. It says the words alarm and detector are used interchangeably. If the home uses only electric appliances and has no attached garage, the host can select that a carbon monoxide alarm is not necessary. The page also says to check local regulations, which may require more than one working smoke and carbon monoxide alarm.

Safety expectations: hosts should state whether smoke and carbon monoxide detectors are present. If they are present, they need to be in working order, and hosts should test them regularly. An inoperable smoke detector is one of the fire hazards the page says to address before accepting reservations, along with blocked exits and exposed wiring. The page says hosts must follow applicable laws, including fire-code requirements and occupancy limits.

Use the “not necessary” choice for a carbon monoxide alarm only when both parts of Airbnb’s exception are true and local rules do not require the alarm anyway. New Airbnb host checklist collects the listing steps for safety devices, the first aid kit, and exterior cameras.

On the same safety page, lockboxes and entry codes must stay secure, and hosts should change codes between reservations. Test the code you intend to send. Retire the previous one.

If Wi-Fi is an amenity, confirm a phone can join with the name and password in the check-in instructions. A printed card can be made with the Wi-Fi QR generator or the Wi-Fi card generator. The code is created in the browser. The password is not sent to this site, and it is not encrypted in the image, so keep the card inside the home. What to put on your Airbnb Wi-Fi sign and guest welcome info lists what else belongs on the welcome note.

What not to assign to the guest

House rules and requests: Airbnb says this policy applies to reservations booked on or after November 20, 2026. Hosts are generally not allowed to ask guests to complete tasks that take significant effort or time, or that a cleaner would usually do. The examples on the page are stripping the bed, taking trash offsite, and washing and putting away dishes. House rules and requests have to be in the designated section of the listing at booking. A sign, a message, or a conversation after booking is not a substitute.

That is why this checklist belongs to the host or the cleaner. A checkout note can repeat a rule that was already on the listing, such as quiet hours or locking the door. It is not a place to add a new chore. How to set quiet hours and a noise policy for your Airbnb covers those hours. The house rules generator prints a sheet from rules you type, in the browser. Use it for rules that are already on the listing. It does not add a checkout chore. How to write Airbnb house rules covers what belongs in that section, including the chores the house-rules policy leaves off.

Additional fees: the cleaning fee is a flat fixed fee per booking for general cleanup after checkout. Hosts should not impose fees, charges, or penalties because a guest did not perform a specific cleaning or checkout task. The help-center pages linked here were checked on 26 October 2026.

Price this turnover

Build the fee from the cost of one turnover, then read what the guest pays and what you keep.

The cleaning fee calculator adds the amounts you type:

cost basis = cleaner + laundry + supplies + hours × hourly rate
cost-plus fee = cost basis × (1 + operating margin)
recommended fee = cost-plus fee, rounded up to the next five-unit increment

The currency control changes labels only. Enter every amount in the same currency. The recommended fee is a starting point for one turnover. How to Build a Sustainable Cleaning Fee walks through the same cost categories. Compare a short stay and a longer stay before you pick the amount, because a flat fee is a larger share of a one-night total.

Put that fee, the nightly rate, and the number of nights into the Airbnb fee calculator. How to set an Airbnb cleaning fee shows how the flat fee sits inside the booking subtotal, and how the split fee and the host-only fee change the guest total and the payout. Airbnb host service fees explained quotes the percentages Airbnb publishes. Replace the calculator’s starting percentages with the ones in your account.

Airbnb’s cleaning-fee page says the fee typically pays for the housekeeping you expect to do after a stay. You can opt into a lower short-term stay cleaning fee for guests who book 1 or 2 nights. The standard fee applies to all stays, or to stays longer than 2 nights when that short-stay fee is on. Both amounts are set at booking from the length of the stay. When a reservation changes, verify the fee against the final terms. A special offer does not add the cleaning fee unless you include it.

On desktop, that page gives these steps:

Click Calendar and select the listing you want to change.
Click Pricing, then click Fees.
Click Cleaning fee and add or edit the amount.
Click Save.

The result on this site is a planning estimate. It is not tax or legal advice, and it is not Airbnb’s calculation for a reservation.

Local rules

Fire codes, waste rules, and occupancy limits differ by place. Airbnb’s safety page says hosts must follow the laws that apply, including fire code and occupancy limits. This checklist does not say which of those rules apply to a given home. Check them with the local authority before you rely on this list.

Help center pages checked on 26 October 2026

https://www.airbnb.com/help/article/2895 for cleanliness between stays, hazards, and amenities that match the listing.
https://www.airbnb.com/help/article/2343 for the five essential amenities.
https://www.airbnb.com/help/article/1189 for spare linens, time between reservations, and Wi-Fi in the check-in instructions.
https://www.airbnb.com/help/article/514 for smoke and carbon monoxide alarms, testing, and the all-electric exception.
https://www.airbnb.com/help/article/2904 for working detectors, entry codes, and following local fire and occupancy rules.
https://www.airbnb.com/help/article/4168 for house rules on reservations booked on or after November 20, 2026.
https://www.airbnb.com/help/article/2385 for the flat cleaning fee and the ban on checkout-task penalties.
https://www.airbnb.com/help/article/58 for the short-stay fee, special offers, and the steps to edit the fee.