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Airbnb iCal link: build a cleaning schedule from it

· Readyby team · 6 min read

Every Airbnb listing already has a cleaning schedule hidden inside it: each checkout is a cleaning, and each next check-in is its deadline. The trouble is getting that information to the person with the mop. This guide shows how to export your Airbnb iCal link, what the feed does and does not tell you, the usual manual ways hosts share it with cleaners, and where those break.

Airbnb lets you export each listing's calendar as an iCal (.ics) link. On a computer, the steps in Airbnb's help centre currently look like this:

  1. Open Calendar and pick the listing.
  2. Open Availability.
  3. Under Connect calendars, choose Connect to another website.
  4. Copy the Airbnb calendar link.

Menus move around from time to time, so if your screen looks different, look for the calendar sync or export option in the listing's availability settings. Airbnb keeps the current instructions in its article on syncing calendars.

Two things to know before you share the link. First, it is per listing: three apartments mean three links. Second, anyone who has the link can read the calendar, so share it only with people and tools you trust.

What the Airbnb calendar feed contains (and what it doesn't)

Open the link in a text editor and you will see a list of events. Each one is a stretch of dates:

  • Reservations appear with the title "Reserved".
  • Blocked nights appear as "Airbnb (Not available)". These are nights you closed yourself, but Airbnb also blocks nights because of availability settings such as preparation time, advance notice or minimum stay.
  • A short description with a link to the reservation and the last four digits of the guest's phone number.

What is not in the feed matters more for cleaning:

  • No guest names. Airbnb removed them from the export years ago.
  • No check-in or check-out times. Events are whole days. The feed says the guest leaves on the 14th, not that they leave at 10:00 or asked for a late checkout.
  • No guest count, so you can't tell from the feed whether to make up two beds or four.
  • Reservations and blocks look alike to most calendar apps. A night you blocked for a plumber shows up like a stay unless something reads the title.

So the feed gives you the shape of the week: which days have a checkout and which have a new arrival. Times, bed set-ups and special requests have to come from somewhere else, usually your house rules and the guest messages.

Three manual ways to keep cleaners informed

Most hosts start with one of these. They all work for a while.

A shared calendar

You subscribe to the Airbnb link in Google Calendar (Other calendars, From URL) and share that calendar with your cleaner. It costs nothing and the cleaner sees bookings on her phone.

Where it breaks: Google decides when to refresh a subscribed calendar, and you can't force it, so a same-day booking can appear hours late. The cleaner sees stays, not cleanings: she still has to work out that a checkout on Tuesday with a new guest on Tuesday means a tight turnover. Blocked nights look like bookings. And nobody confirms anything: you don't know whether she has seen the change.

A spreadsheet

One row per checkout: date, apartment, cleaner, next check-in, notes. You copy dates over from Airbnb once or twice a week.

Where it breaks: it is only as fresh as your last update. A booking made on Friday night for Saturday never makes it in. Cancellations are worse, because nobody removes the row and the cleaner turns up to an empty flat that didn't need cleaning.

A WhatsApp group

The fastest option and the most common. You post tomorrow's plan in the evening, cleaners reply with a thumbs-up.

Where it breaks: the plan is buried under photos and chat within a day. Changes go out as new messages and some people only read the first one. With several apartments and two or three cleaners, the group turns into a guessing game about who is going where. It also depends on one person remembering to post, every day, including when they are on holiday.

All three have the same weak spot: a person has to notice a change in Airbnb and pass it on. With one apartment that is easy. With five, a late booking or a cancellation will slip through sooner or later.

Turn the calendar into a cleaning schedule

Whatever tool you use, the logic for an Airbnb cleaning schedule is the same:

  1. Every checkout creates a cleaning. The date comes from the feed.
  2. The window runs from checkout to the next check-in. Use your listing's house-rule times, since the feed has none. If there's no next arrival, the cleaning can happen any time that day or later.
  3. Tight windows get flagged. A same-day check-in with a two-hour window for a 150-minute clean is a problem today, not on the day.
  4. Blocks need a rule. Decide once whether a blocked night needs a cleaning afterwards (owner stays usually do; a plumber's day usually doesn't).
  5. Changes must reach the cleaner. A moved or cancelled booking is only handled once the cleaner knows.

If a guest asks to stay longer on the day, that's a separate problem with its own rules; our late-checkout playbook covers it.

Readyby starts from the same Airbnb iCal link. You paste it in, Readyby creates the apartment and reads the calendar, then checks it again every few minutes.

  • Each checkout becomes a cleaning with a window from checkout to the next check-in, using the check-in and check-out times you set for the apartment. Short windows are marked so you see them first.
  • Readyby suggests a cleaner for each cleaning. You confirm or pick someone else.
  • The AI coordinator sends the plan to the cleaner on WhatsApp, in her own language, and asks her to confirm. If a booking moves or is cancelled, the cleaning moves or is cancelled and she is told. There's more on why language matters in cleaners in their own language.
  • Blocked nights don't create cleanings unless you switch on cleaning after owner blocks for that apartment.
  • The cleaner opens a checklist in her browser from a personal link (no app to install) and adds photos. You see the day on the Today screen, and the owner can get a photo report.

Readyby only keeps what the feed gives it: dates, plus the guest count and source where available. It ignores the phone digits in the description. It can't invent the information iCal lacks, either: times come from your apartment settings, not from Airbnb. Direct connections to channel managers, which will bring exact times and guest counts, are coming; today everything runs through iCal (see integrations).

If the same apartment is also listed on Booking.com, connect both calendars; our guide to the Booking.com iCal cleaning schedule explains how and why.

Try it with your own calendar

The quickest way to judge is to see your next two weeks of cleanings laid out from your own link. Click through the interactive demo, or start free and paste your Airbnb link. Setup takes about 15 minutes.