What Chicago Airbnbs actually charge
The median Chicago listing asks $223 a night, but the city median is close to meaningless here: Loop runs +52.5% above it and Lower West Side runs -19.2% below. Chicago has the sharpest neighborhood gradient of the four US markets we publish. Figures below are recomputed from the 8,660 listings in the June 2026 Inside Airbnb snapshot.
The whole distribution, not the average
Every percentile below is computed from the listings that publish a nightly rate (7,601 of 8,660, or 87.8%). Half of the market sits inside the shaded band.
Chicago has the softest floor of the four markets — the 10th percentile is $71 — and that bottom decile is real inventory, not noise: this is the market with the largest share of private rooms among the four. If you run an entire unit, the practical consequence is that a fifth of your search results are not actually your competition, and pricing against the unfiltered city median drags you below where your unit belongs.
What to charge, by size
This is the table to start from. Find your bedroom count, and treat the 25th–75th percentile band as the range a listing like yours can defend without an argument. Going above the 75th requires a reason a guest can see in the photos.
| Size | 25th pct | Median | 75th pct | Listings |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 bedroom | $141 | $188 | $270 | 1,561 |
| 2 bedrooms | $176 | $246 | $347 | 2,010 |
| 3 bedrooms | $237 | $328 | $479 | 1,179 |
| 4+ bedrooms | $393 | $580 | $889 | 722 |
Listings without a stated bedroom count are excluded, which is why these counts don't add up to the city total.
Price by neighborhood
This is the table that matters most in Chicago. Inside Airbnb publishes 77 named neighborhood areas, and the top eight by listing count span from +52.5% to -19.2% against the city median. Loop and Near North Side are the price ceiling; Logan Square and Lower West Side sit below the median with real listing volume. Your neighborhood is doing more work on your rate than any renovation you are considering.
| Neighborhood | Median | vs city | Listings |
|---|---|---|---|
| Near North Side | $326 | +46.1% | 1,061 |
| West Town | $270 | +20.9% | 770 |
| Loop | $340 | +52.5% | 607 |
| Near West Side | $255 | +14.4% | 601 |
| Lake View | $294 | +31.6% | 533 |
| Logan Square | $209 | -6.2% | 408 |
| Lincoln Park | $330 | +48.2% | 285 |
| Lower West Side | $180 | -19.2% | 240 |
Inside Airbnb publishes Chicago geography as 77 named neighborhood areas. Areas with fewer than 30 priced listings are left out — the median stops meaning anything below that.
Entire place, private room, or hotel room
Mixing these together is the most common way a host misreads their own market. The medians are far apart, and the mix determines what “the average listing in my city” even means.
| Type | Median | Share of market | Listings |
|---|---|---|---|
| Entire home/apt | $257 | 76.9% | 6,663 |
| Private room | $86 | 21.9% | 1,895 |
| Hotel room | $373 | 0.8% | 70 |
| Shared room | $46 | 0.4% | 32 |
The competition you can measure: reviews
Price is the number hosts obsess over; reviews are the number that decides whether your price is ever seen. Here is the field you are actually up against.
| Measure | Value | What it means for you |
|---|---|---|
| Listings with zero reviews | 17.6% | 1,523 listings competing with no social proof at all |
| Median review count | 20 | Half the market is below this |
| 75th percentile | 77 | Clearing this puts you in the top quarter |
| 90th percentile | 170 | The established operators |
| Median rating | 4.87 | Among the 7,137 listings that have one |
| Rated 4.9 or higher | 44.5% | Of rated listings — this is the bar, not 4.5 |
| Rated 4.5 or higher | 91% | Below 4.5 you are in the bottom decile |
Amenities: table stakes versus differentiators
An amenity that 70% of your market already lists is not a selling point — it is a box you get penalized for leaving unchecked. One that fewer than 40% of listings can claim is worth putting in your title. We measured 3,229 distinct amenity labels in this market; these are the ones with enough volume to price against.
- Wifi — 90.2% of listings
- Kitchen — 90% of listings
- Self check-in — 76.7% of listings
- Dryer — 25.3% of listings
- Free parking on premises — 28% of listings
- Pets allowed — 34.6% of listings
- BBQ grill — 22.8% of listings
- Pool — 8.8% of listings
- Elevator — 20.1% of listings
- Gym — 14.8% of listings
- Hot tub — 3.5% of listings
- Crib — 13.4% of listings
- EV charger — 3.5% of listings
| Amenity | With | Without | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pool | $250 | $257 | -2.7% |
| Hot tub | $256 | $257 | -0.3% |
| Free parking on premises | $267 | $252 | +6.2% |
| Self check-in | $266 | $214 | +24.2% |
Chicago is an indoor market and the amenity data says so plainly. A pool (-2.7%) and a hot tub (-0.3%) show essentially no association with asking price — the opposite of Broward. What does track is friction removal: entire places with self check-in ask $266 against $214, +24.2%.
Two prevalence numbers are worth pinning up. Free parking is on only 28% of Chicago listings — less than half the rate in Austin — so it is a genuine differentiator here rather than table stakes, and it belongs in your title if you have it. And air conditioning is on 63.4%, the lowest of the four markets, which makes it a summer booking filter that a third of your competition fails.
How to use this page
- Find your band. Bedroom count first, then adjust by your neighborhood using the percentage in the second table.
- Check where you sit in it. If you are below the 25th percentile for your size and area, you are likely leaving money on the table. Above the 75th, your listing has to look like it.
- Fix the free things first. Reviews, photos, title and amenity completeness move bookings without capital. The differentiator list above tells you which claims are actually scarce in your market.
Frequently asked
How much should I charge for an Airbnb in Chicago?
The median Chicago listing asks $223 per night, but neighborhood matters more than the city figure: medians among the highest-volume areas range from $180 in Lower West Side to $340 in Loop. By size, entire one-bedroom places run $141 to $270 and two-bedrooms $176 to $347. From the June 2026 Inside Airbnb snapshot of 8,660 listings.
Which Chicago neighborhoods have the highest Airbnb prices?
Among the eight neighborhoods with the most listings, Loop has the highest median at $340 (+52.5% against the city median), followed by Near North Side at $326 and Lincoln Park at $330. Lower West Side is the lowest of the eight at $180.
Do I need air conditioning for a Chicago Airbnb?
Only 63.4% of Chicago listings report air conditioning — the lowest share of the four US markets we publish. That makes it a real filter in summer: if you have it, say so in the title and the amenity list, because a meaningful slice of your competition cannot.
How many reviews does a typical Chicago Airbnb have?
The median Chicago listing has 20 reviews and 17.6% have none. Median rating among rated listings is 4.87, with 44.5% at 4.9 or above.
Is this booked revenue or asking price?
Asking price. These are published nightly rates before cleaning fees, service fees and taxes. Occupancy and revenue are not in this dataset.
More on the Chicago market
- Source
- Inside Airbnb — public data export, Chicago, IL snapshot dated 2026-06-24.
- Sample
- 8,660 listings. A nightly rate is published for 7,601 of them (87.8%); the rest are blank in the source and are excluded from every price figure on this page.
- What the price is
- The base nightly rate as listed, in US dollars, with no conversion applied. It excludes cleaning fees, service fees and taxes, and it is an asking price — not a booked rate, and not revenue.
- Method
- Percentiles are computed by linear interpolation over the sorted sample. Medians are used throughout instead of averages because the tail is extreme enough to make an average meaningless. Every figure on this page is recomputed from the source file at build time by scripts/market_stats_en.py — none of them is typed by hand.