Airbnb reported second-quarter revenue of $3.1 billion, up 17% from a year earlier, and net income of $816 million ($1.03 per share), surpassing analysts’ estimates.

Airbnb’s stock jumped more than 15% after its strongest growth quarter in years, with the CEO crediting a portion of the rebound to artificial intelligence.

The company plans to invest more in AI tokens this year, signaling higher AI-related costs but an expectation of greater ROI and revenue from AI-driven efficiency and demand.

Chesky characterizes Airbnb as an AI-native company and describes a historic shift from skepticism to strong conviction about AI’s impact on growth.

Internally, Airbnb tracks AI adoption by measuring output and productivity gains across teams, with revenue per employee expected to rise as AI usage expands.

Airbnb faces regulatory and market pressures, including New York City scrutiny over illegal listings and host regulation, as it pushes to boost revenue.

Chesky admits underestimating AI’s impact and plans to spend significantly more on AI in 2026, boosting Airbnb’s full-year outlook due to expected ROI.

Airbnb is selective about AI models, using more than a dozen, including Claude Code and Codex, prioritizing cost-effective solutions and favoring open-source models for consumer tasks while deploying frontier models for tougher problems.

Ahmad Al-Dahle, formerly Meta’s head of generative AI, was hired as Airbnb’s chief technology officer to lead the AI transformation and make the company more AI-driven across operations.

Product development is speeding up, with a roughly 60% reduction in development time and about 80% more features shipped year over year, all while headcount stays nearly flat despite higher AI spending.

AI is already improving demand, supply, and customer service through AI-powered search, personalized listing highlights, price optimization for hosts, and faster host-guest interactions, with 45% of AI-driven guest interactions not needing human agents.

Chesky notes AI is enhancing Airbnb’s ability to attract bookings, assist hosts with listing creation and pricing, and reduce customer-service costs.