Expedia vs Hotels.com: Which Is Better For You? [2024]

Expedia vs Hotels.com: After the pandemic finally loosened, people have started to step out of their comfort zones and back to travel and tourism.

Since everything has received a change, ‘do the old travel websites like Expedia and Hotels.com work the same?’ is a question everyone is recently wondering about. 

Are you also confused between Expedia and Hotels.com and wish to find out which among the two is the best service provider? 

In that case, we welcome you to our comparison article between Expedia vs Hotels.com mentioned below.

Expedia vs Hotels.com: Overview

Expedia

Expedia Group Inc is one of the leading online travel shopping companies for small business and Consumer travel. The platform is a promising place to inquire and plan for hotels, car rentals, flights and vacation homes.

It is your one-stop travel website for your dream vacation. Expedia offers single bookings for car rentals, accommodation and bundle bookings which can help you save some money while you get booking confirmation for a good set of things altogether.

Hotels.com

Hotels.com is a reliable site for booking hotel rooms online or by telephone. The company handles over 80 websites available to access in 34 languages. It has listed over 300,000 hotels, rarely giving a scam any chance.

Hotels.com acts as an ultimate tourism accommodation website that helps users find cheap hotels with discounted offers. The platform allows users to compare deals, read unbiased reviews on hotels and receive multiple promotional deals to save more.

Hotels.com has also launched its app to make users comfortable while using its services. The working of the app is similar to the official website.

Expedia vs Hotels.com: How to use

Expedia

You have to start by visiting their official website and navigating around the bit if you are new to it. After you have decided for what reason you are going to use the website, on the homepage at the very start you will see a white box with options for stays, flights, cars, packages, things to do and cruises.

Select the one which you want and fill in the details required accurately. For instance, if you are looking for hotels, tap on the Stays option at the start then tell them how many people are travelling. They will assign the rooms accordingly.

Furthermore, select your destination then the check-in and checkout date. If you wish to add adjustments for flights and car results, put a tick on both the boxes and tap on the search option. 

It will start showing you all the relevant and best deals available at the moment for the best hotels in the destination.

Hotels.com

As Hotels.com only deals with hotels, after visiting their website, you will see a white box with blanks related to Hotel results. Fill in all the details like your destination, the dates of your stay and the number of people travelling for them to decide the number of rooms you are looking for.

After reviewing the information, tap on the search option and the results, the best deals will start pouring in. Based on the honest reviews by the users, you can decide which hotel can suit your taste better.

Expedia vs Hotels.com: What do they offer?

Expedia

As Expedia is an actual travel and tourism website, it offers services in almost every field.

• Hotels – they offer users with the best hotel results. It decides the number of rooms for you after you have set in the number of travellers. You can also adjust your settings and add a flight and car rental filter to make a better deal.
• Flights – Expedia offers you round trip, one-way trips and multi-city trips. You can put in the filters for the number of people travelling and the class you wish to take. Add on other details and it will show you the reasonable deals on flights.
• Car Rentals- Expedia offers services for rental cars as well as airport transportation. It also allows you to add a different drop-off place. While searching for car rental deals, you can put in any discount codes you have and also take AARP member rates if you have opted for membership.
• Packages – you can decide which type of package you are looking for. Expedia offers packages for hotels and flights, flights and car rentals, car rental and hotels and all of the three in one package. It also offers accommodations if you wish to have it for only one part of your trip.
• Things to do – in this section you have to type in the name of the destination and the period you are going to spend there. Expedia will give you the list of the events happening between that period of time. You can also search for event tickets for sports, musical festivals and concerts through Expedia.
• Cruises – type in the name of your destination and departure dates to get the list of Cruises active at that time. Expedia also offers expert cruise advice through calling.

Hotels.com

Unlike Expedia, Hotels.com only focuses on finding hotels, they make sure they do that work perfectly. Hotels.com works professionally to find you the fairest stays with the fairest deals available. It compares the best places, user experiences and other factors to bring you good results.

While you can get complete money-saving packages at Expedia, it is recommended to go for Hotels.com if you only wish to find hotels online. 

Why? Because, though Expedia is a good option for almost everything they offer, it sounds better to trust Hotels.com and their services as they are exclusively providing you with the better choices.

Expedia vs Hotels.com: Rewards

Expedia

Expedia Rewards is a popular program for those travellers who travel frequently and love saving on travelling. 

Expedia Rewards is a free-to-join program and after you have successfully become a member of the club, you can instantly start enjoying member perks, collecting points and unlocking membership perks, which honestly is one of the best things offered by Expedia.

You can start collecting points on some qualified bookings. The member prices will always give better deals than the normal deals for other users.

While you are earning points, they will be converted into dollars which you can use to save more on your next eligible journey with Expedia.

There are higher tiers for additional members-only perks which you can get if you keep travelling with Expedia and collecting more points.

Hotels.com

Hotels.com Rewards is like a club program that gives the members additional perks. With Hotels.com Rewards, you can unlock secret prices and deals like getting 10% off instantly on the complete booking and the prices will always be better than the normal deals for normal users.

You can unlock the One Reward Night present for every 10 nights you stay at one place. Along with this, you can track rewards in more than 1,000,000 properties worldwide. On top of that, being a member will get you free cancellation and flexible bookings on most of the hotels listed.

Comparing both the brand’s rewards programs, 

Winner: Expedia, seems to have an upper hand over Hotels.com. 

While you can enjoy the ultimate one reward night benefit at Hotels.com, if you are not going to stay for 10 nights, which is indeed a long time, we are sure you will love to opt for the earning points program which can help you keep saving on your upcoming trips with Expedia.

Expedia vs Hotels.com: Best For

Expedia

While Expedia is better known for offering amazing deals, its incredible search filters feature that helps you narrow down your search and stop wasting time acts as one of its robust features.

Expedia also promotes purchasing Trip Insurance which is crucial for travelling nowadays. Additionally, you can keep getting additional deals with the Expedia rewards program on every trip in future.

In short, let it be accommodation or travelling, you can use Expedia for every service they offer and they will do their best to serve you systematically.

In conclusion, it is best for:

• Bundle booking.
• Coordinating your complete vacation step-by-step without confusion.
• Expedia rewards system.

Hotels.com

As Hotels.com only focuses on providing you with promising hotel choices, it is best known for the same purpose. 

Additionally, Hotels.com helps you travel with confidence. They offer you choices with official high health standards. Social distancing is considered a top priority along with accurate hygiene and sanitation.

In conclusion, it is best for:

• Presenting hotels that prioritise hygiene and sanitation.
• Hotels.com Rewards program.

Expedia vs Hotels.com: Not Best For

Expedia

While Expedia is good at almost everything they offer, the one negative point they certainly hold is their certain policies and customer service. If you are lucky enough to go through your trip without contacting them, you are at a good edge. 

But, in case you have to deal with their customer service, you will either be left waiting without any response for a long time or they will take their time to resolve your problem. Better not deal with them when you are in a hurry.

Also, not all, but there are certain policies they are strict about which confuse users. They prefer being more official than kind to their customers, something which not all customers prefer. 

In conclusion, it is not best for:

• Customer service.
• Partly single bookings and other small services.

Hotels.com

Similarly like Expedia, Hotels.com is best at what they offer and adds other general services. For instance, if you are to receive your refund, you will most likely get your refund through vouchers instead of actual funds being transferred to your account.

At times, prices drop way too much making it suspicious for users to trust the website and the hotel. The prices fluctuate according to different factors and they will charge you more if the price is increased when you are in the middle of booking.

In conclusion, it is not best for:

• Very frequent fluctuations in prices at times and other small services.

Expedia vs Hotels.com: Which is Better?

Honestly speaking, both Expedia and Hotels.com have their advantages and disadvantages. They both are stable websites offering satisfying services to their customers but have certain drawbacks which has made them receive some horrible impressions.

On the better part, if you are willing to book through bundle bookings or flight tickets, car rentals and hotels altogether, it is best to opt for one website to do everything, and the name is Expedia.

But, if you are only thinking about renting rooms, it would be better to go for the smaller company which is solely focused on providing services for only one sector, Hotels. The name is Hotels.com.

Final Words

While Expedia and Hotels.com are providing customers with good quality services, customers are supposed to be responsible and careful while moving ahead with every step.

If you ask us, we will highly suggest you go for Expedia if you are going for somewhere far as Expedia‘s network is no joke in this industry. But, if you are travelling within the state or local borders then Hotels.com is a convenient option.

We hope by reading our comparison article between Expedia and Hotels.com, you now have enough information to decide which company is a suitable choice for you.

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