Leave a Review Hostelworld
Great resource, bad functionality
This app is really helpful for finding hostels in lots of locations with helpful reviews. However, the UX of the app is pretty terrible in my opinion. The search feature is inconvenient as you must select dates, # of guests, etc. What if I just want to see what my options are quickly? I shouldn’t have to fill out all of my trip details to see what hostels exist in a given location. Selecting dates and guest should be an option after you search a city. The wishlist feature is also not as helpful as it could be. I can’t figure out how to remove anything from a wishlist, and you can’t book directly from the wishlist- you have to find the hostel again through the annoying search. Not helpful. You also can’t edit a booking, only cancel and re-book (and they hold your deposit as long as they want to 😒) I think this app could be great with some improvements, but for now I only use it to find hostels and I book directly on their site.Show lessRaboobz
Phenomenal but latent
A friend referred me to this app as he had used it in his travels. I too highly recommend this app. I have had an overall wonderful experience with the app. Not only was I able to find hostels in *most* all the areas I wanted, I was also able to find things to do in the surrounding areas, at great prices might I add too. The only downside to the app on my end is I keep running into latency issues and app crashes. I have tried restarting the app and changing VPN settings and even turning my VPN off, ensuring the app is up to date, etc etc. the app still tends to lag a bit at random when my connect is fine otherwise on every other app in my phone. Then every now and then the app will crash. I still highly recommend this app, however, looking forward to figuring out this latency and crashing issue at some point.Show lessPoeticFailure
They will turn their back on you when you need them.
Cheap prices but they do not care about their customers! If you get unlucky and something happens, don’t count on them, even if you’re a loyal customer. Twice they let me down. The first: a hostel asked me to email them my card info before arrival despite making a deposit through Hostelworld. I’ve stayed at dozens of hostels and was never asked for my card info prior to arrival. It seemed suspicious, so I asked them to have HostelWorld notify me directly if an action is needed. Instead, they canceled my reservation a few days before I arrived and HostelWorld wouldn’t refund my deposit. I had to book another place for 2x the price due to short notice. Second: Myself and two others were robbed within 1 week in the same hostel. I was robbed twice. The reception could have been more helpful by looking at hallway footage but said it would take too long! I left a factual & honest review for the hostel, warning others of the theft in respectful language, and HostelWorld deleted my review.Show lessdonadams96
Useful service but terrible app
The app is extremely slow and buggy. It takes a few seconds to load anything in the app which can be extremely annoying when just checking things quickly. Lots of performance issues. When you open up a page of who is staying at your hostel, it must try and load every single person in the list at once rather than lazy loading. So, when I try to view a list of the 80 people staying at my hostel, the app freezes for a good 30 seconds before even showing the list. The messaging functionality is also extremely buggy and every chat is filled with “Is anyone else solo traveling?”, followed by a message like “I didn’t mean to send that” because everyone accidentally hits the quick chat things.Show lessSam-Yo
Don’t use HostelWorld!
If you can avoid it, I wouldn’t use HostelWorld. Try to go directly through the hostel itself. HostelWorld charges a “deposit” that is a percentage of the total. I say “deposit” because it goes directly to them and not to the hostel you’re booking through. HostelWorld doesn’t allow you to change your booking on their website, only cancel which can be inconvenient if you only want to update and not completely delete the reservation. If you want to update your reservation you have to go through the hostel directly. If you update through the hostel, that “deposit” you paid is not put towards your new balance and it is non-refundable. So basically that money is gone and you don’t get it back. Since the money was never sent to the hostel they have no way of helping you. Most hostels don’t charge a deposit on your booking so I would ALWAYS go through them directly. Learn from my mistake!!Show less6584029375
Brilliant Overall
Please try a hostel! Some of my favorite memories have come as a result of staying somewhere I booked on this app. The best new feature is the city and hostel chats. Great for backpackers looking to meet up and make friends. However, not every property listed is truly a hostel, and be sure to check that the dorm or price listed available is applicable to you (female only dorms). At the risk of private equity completely commercializing hostel adventures for profit, sometimes you can save a few bucks and book directly with a hostel website and rather than this app taking 10% or so. I hope this app can continue to leverage technology and it’s network size while still creating authentic travel experiences.Show lessXxXxios
Having issues with the messaging and chat functions
So the app is great, but I was really hoping I could talk with some of the travelers before I left because it’s my first time going to a hostel. I don’t know if it’s my phone, but I tried tapping the message button on people’s profiles and it wouldn’t do anything. Then when I went to the chat function, it said that I needed to book a hostel to unlock, but I had already booked two hostels. Maybe those hostels don’t have chat functions enabled, but my main issue is the Message button not working. Again, that could just be my phone, but everything else in the app has worked for me. Otherwise, it’s a good app.Show lessBunny97$
Sticker prices are often wrong
The app itself is good, and the general information you can see on each hostel is really useful, however… it’s really hard to know what you’ll actually pay for your stay, before you get there. Hostelworld typically doesn’t seem to include taxes and (usually more importantly) fees. So even though you may think you’ve already fully paid, you’ll often need to pay more once you try to check in. It’s never been more than like 30% extra or so of your initial price, but that’s still significant and I don’t understand why Hostelworld can’t include that in the price you pay through the app, or at least SHOW the full price you’ll actually pay when you’re comparing hostels. (Note that I’m not even talking about those classic scummy spots that charge you extra for sheets once you get there, even though, there too, I feel like Hostelworld should be able to indicate that in the itemized bill, or a notice as you check out that that will be the case). Point is, I wish Hostelworld would crackdown on the shady practices of SOME, though not all, hostels on the app.Show lessordamn
Age Discrimination & Policies
We suggest that you either don’t allow hostels that discriminate against older travelers to post on your site OR you create a filter that can be set so that we don’t get cheated out of our time & money. Most of the places write the age range at the very bottom or randomly in the middle of their policies and when you show up they cancel and keep your money! THIS IS A SCAM. I am over 40 and my boyfriend is under 40 and this is super annoying!! Just tell us where we can and cannot stay and don’t make us play the ‘Where’s Waldo’ game of who can and cannot stay somewhere. It’s highly likely that these policies are illegal (age discrimination) in some countries. We contacted a lawyer in Czech Republic who said we have a case if we wanted it for Hostel One. Just make things clear so we can all have a pleasant journey!Show lessNot Age 18-30
Really nice hostel
Really nice hostel, the common areas are
really clean welcoming, and comfortable, I stayed in a mix dorm that had a lot of rooms but they arranged it in a way that it didn't feel like that many people. There was also an array of different ages from early 20-50s which I
thought was kind of cool. I think my only
complaint is people left the door to the room
open often so anyone could just walk in there,
but the hostel itself can't control that. They
serve an option for breakfast that looked good
And have free coffee, there is also a nice little shop right downstairs with some authentic Mexican food as well, they are conveniently located near everything and right on the
beach! I will definitely come back.Show lessKrmaho
