Building hotel room booking software typically requires significant development resources, coding expertise, and months of work to create functional web and mobile applications. For hotel owners and entrepreneurs looking to streamline their reservation systems, the traditional development route presents barriers that can delay launch and drain budgets before the first booking ever comes through.
Fortunately, no-code platforms have transformed how businesses approach software development. Adalo is a no-code app builder for database-driven web apps and native iOS and Android apps—one version across all three platforms. AI-assisted building and streamlined publishing enable launch to the Apple App Store and Google Play in days rather than months. This means you can create a fully functional hotel booking system complete with room availability, guest management, and payment processing—all without writing a single line of code.
Creating a hotel booking app that reaches guests on every device doesn't have to require a development team or months of coding. Adalo is an AI-powered app builder for database-driven web apps and native iOS and Android apps—one version across all three platforms, published to the Apple App Store and Google Play. This makes it the ideal solution for hoteliers and hospitality entrepreneurs who want to build professional booking software without technical expertise.
Having your hotel booking app available in both app stores means guests can easily discover and download it, while push notifications keep them engaged with booking confirmations, special offers, and check-in reminders. Whether travelers prefer booking on their phones or through a web browser, the platform ensures your software delivers a seamless experience across all platforms—helping you capture more reservations and build lasting guest relationships.
Why Adalo Is Perfect for Building Hotel Room Booking Software
Hotel booking software demands reliability at scale—guests expect instant availability checks, smooth payment processing, and real-time confirmations. Adalo's infrastructure, completely overhauled with the 3.0 release in late 2025, delivers 3-4x faster performance than previous versions and scales dynamically with your app's needs. This means your booking system handles peak season traffic just as smoothly as off-season browsing.
The platform's AI-assisted features accelerate development significantly. Magic Start generates complete app foundations from a simple description—tell it you need a hotel booking system with room availability, guest management, and payment processing, and it creates your database structure, screens, and user flows automatically. What used to take days of planning happens in minutes. Magic Add lets you expand functionality by describing what you want: "add a loyalty points system" or "include a room service ordering feature."
For hospitality businesses, the combination of no record limits on paid plans and native app compilation means you can grow from a boutique property to a hotel chain without hitting database ceilings or performance walls. Over 3 million apps have been created on Adalo, with the visual builder described as "easy as PowerPoint"—making it accessible whether you're a hotel owner, property manager, or hospitality entrepreneur.
Hotel Room Booking Software Development: Getting Started
Instead of jumping head over heels into developing your hotel room booking app, you'll need to have a plan. Before you start building, ensure you have these 3 prerequisites:
- An Adalo membership for building web and native mobile apps: Adalo is a versatile app builder that balances functionality with ease of use, allowing you to start building apps immediately. The platform combines simplicity with powerful features, including nearly 40 templates you can customize to your needs, wants, and preferences—you'll be able to make a finished product that looks on-brand and exactly the way you want it.
Adalo provides various add-ons, plugins, and integrations with platforms such as QuickBooks, MailChimp, and Zapier. With unlimited database records on paid plans and no usage-based charges, the platform packs enough punch to bring any hotel booking software ideas to life without worrying about bill shock as your guest list grows.
- Features and functionalities: What other unique functionalities do you want to add to your software besides booking rooms? For instance, you can create a messaging feature so folks don't have to use their phone or fumble through text messages.
Write down a list of each feature and functionality you want to include in your software. That way, you won't forget to include anything when you start building.
- A set of wireframes: Wireframes are digital blueprints that give you a screen-by-screen layout of your software. Instead of going the cumbersome route using a pencil and paper, wireframing is done using an online program.
Lucidchart offers a popular wireframing tool with a free version that provides about 100 templates. Using this tool will give you a solid idea of how your software will appear. That said, Adalo's Magic Start feature can generate your initial app structure from a description, potentially reducing the wireframing work needed.
Parts of Hotel Booking Software
When you build your hotel booking software with Adalo, you won't need to use any third-party app-building software to finish. The platform lets you build the major parts of any software, which are:
- Frontend: The frontend has all your screens, pictures, text, and more. This is the part of your booking software with which your potential clients and clients will interact. They'll use it to browse available rooms, make reservations, send payments, and more.
- Backend: Unlike your software's frontend, users won't see your backend. But they'll interact with it, as the backend serves as your software's command center. It will pull up rooms and pictures, deliver messages from the frontend to your inbox, connect with integrations, and much more.
- Database: Your software's database is essentially its information warehouse, storing data about rooms, payments, clients, and much more.
The backend works closely with your database, sending it info that clients enter on the frontend and dipping into it to deliver data that you or your clients request.
Adalo provides its own prepackaged database with no record caps on paid plans—a significant advantage for hotel booking systems that accumulate reservation history, guest profiles, and transaction records over time. Just like your frontend and backend, you'll be able to edit and configure it to your unique needs. If you already have a database through a provider such as Airtable, Google Sheets, or Xano, Adalo will let you connect it to your software in just a couple of clicks.
For Google Sheets users, SheetBridge turns your existing spreadsheet into an actual database—the easiest path for hoteliers who already track room inventory or guest information in spreadsheets. No database learning curve required.
Now it's time to get started building your hotel room booking software.
Hotel Booking Software Building Guide
Step 1: Starting Your Hotel Booking App
You have two paths to begin building. The traditional approach uses Adalo's premade templates—each template has everything you need to start piecing together your software, such as frontend screens and components, backend commands, and databases.
Adalo offers customizable templates that can be adapted for hotel room booking software. You can modify templates like the real estate app template to include hotel-specific features such as room availability, bookings, and payments.
Alternatively, Magic Start generates a complete app foundation from a description. Describe your hotel booking system—"I need an app where guests can browse room types, check availability by date, make reservations, and pay securely"—and it creates your database structure, screens, and user flows automatically. This AI-assisted approach can save hours of initial setup work.
Step 2: Software Customization Using Adalo's Building Interface
Adalo is one of the most customizable software builders on the market today, making it a breeze to transform your app template into a unique hotel room booking software.
You'll craft and cobble together your software using Adalo's building interface, which is the tool you see after opening your template or Magic Start foundation from your Adalo Account.
Adalo's building interface is relatively straightforward, made up of the following 3 parts:
- Adalo's Building Canvas: Located at the center of your screen, this is where you'll execute your building. You'll see all your software screens (pages) to select for editing by clicking on them. The canvas can display up to 400 screens at once if needed—giving you a bird's-eye view of your entire booking system.
You'll also be able to reposition and resize pieces like pictures, text boxes, and other elements using your cursor. Additionally, you can delete a screen component by clicking it and pressing the "Delete" button on your keyboard.
- Adalo's Horizontal Ribbon: This bar expands across the entire top of your screen, going from left to right. Click the icon at the top right of your screen to access your Adalo account settings and help documentation, which is a rich resource if you get stuck building.
You'll also find a green "View App" button. Select this to preview your app on several different devices, such as an iPhone, Samsung Galaxy, or desktop, as you build. This button also lets you send folks a link so they can download your app.
- Adalo's Editing Dashboard: This is the part of Adalo's Building Interface that you'll use the most. It consists of a vertical drop-down bar located at the far left of your screen. The Editing Dashboard is essentially your software-building toolbox.
It has all the functionalities you need to create every pixel of your software, including selecting, adding, or deleting screens, publishing to the web and app stores, adding color, pictures, features and text, and other essential functions.
The Editing Dashboard's Components
Made up of a total of 9 different functionalities, you'll spend most of your time using the Editing Dashboard to create your software. You'll be able to see the written functionality of an icon when you put your cursor on top of it.
Here's an overview of each functionality and the role it plays in building your software:
- Colorful Circle with a "+" inside: This button adds components like text, lists, and buttons. You'll also be able to access the Adalo Marketplace to add plugins and more. If you were a painter, this button would be your brush—it's the button you'll use the most.
- Branding Button (artist's palette icon): Click this to change up your software's colors and font styles.
- Screens (screen icon): This will display a comprehensive list of all your app's screens. Click on this to swiftly navigate to the screen you want to edit.
- Database Collection (spreadsheet icon): This is where your software's database lives. In Step 3, we'll walk you through its parts and show you how to customize your data.
- Settings (mechanical gear icon): Here, you can write an app description and upload your software's icon, connect APIs, and more.
- Publish (double checkmark icon): This function allows you to publish to the app stores and the web. In step 7, we'll show you how to do both.
- Analytics (chart icon): After you've finished building, you'll use this function quite often. It gives you feedback about your users, their locations, and your most popular screens.
- Version History (a circled check mark inside a rectangle icon): You can create up to 10 versions of your software but publish only one. This button allows you to access each version.
- Hire an expert (check mark inside a spiked circle icon): If you want to contract out the building of your app, do so here. You'll connect with a fully vetted Adalo professional who can guide you through the app-building process efficiently.
Step 3: Customizing Your Software's Database
Adalo has a built-in database, and you can customize it to your needs, such as your software's screens. You can access your database by clicking the "Database" button on your Editing Dashboard.
Here are the 3 parts of your Adalo database:
1. Records: These are the actual data that gets entered into your booking software. They're found inside the cells of your collections. Examples of records can include vacant rooms, rented rooms, booking dates, payments, and more. With no storage caps on paid plans, you can accumulate years of booking history without hitting limits.
2. Properties: You'll find these at the top of every collection—they're the titles of your records, organized in columns. Select a collection to create a new property, then press the "Add to Properties" button.
3. Collections: Appearing and functioning like a spreadsheet, collections are simply groups of similar data. They're the first thing you'll see after clicking on your "Database" button.
The real estate template comes with several collections which can be customized to your hotel booking needs.
To edit your collections, click the 3-dot vertical button to the right of the title. To add a new collection, click "Add Collection" at the bottom of your collections list.
For hotel booking software, you'll typically want collections for: Rooms (type, amenities, pricing, photos), Bookings (dates, guest, room, status), Guests (contact info, preferences, history), and Payments (amount, method, confirmation).
Connecting an External Database to Your Booking Software
If you already have a premade database with Airtable, Google Sheets, or Xano, go ahead and connect it to the template by pushing the "Add External Collection" button in the editing box. Then, follow the directions, and your database will be plugged into your software.
Google Sheets users benefit from SheetBridge, which transforms your spreadsheet into a proper database without requiring you to learn database concepts. If you're already tracking room inventory in a spreadsheet, this is the fastest path to a working booking app.
Step 4: Creating New Screens and Adding Components
You can add new screens to your software in several different ways. First, press the "Screens" button and click "Add New Screens." A selection of screen types will appear on your left. All you need to do is drag the desired one over to your building canvas.
The other way to add another screen is by clicking the "+" button. When you do so, the same selection of screen types will appear to your left.
You can also use Magic Add to create new screens by describing what you need: "add a room details screen with photos, amenities list, and booking button." The AI generates the screen structure, which you can then customize.
Adding Custom Components
Customizing all your screens and components to match your needs and tastes is simple. Just push the "+" button to toggle through all the components. Then, drag your chosen element to the screen you want.
To customize individual components, click the one you want to change on your Building Canvas. An editing box will appear next to your Editing Dashboard, enabling you to customize the colors, background, and more.
You can access another version of the Adalo Marketplace directly from the "+" button to add free and premium plugins. You'll find components such as a Calendar Strip that lets users view your calendar as a string of days, a marker pin to show precise locations on a map, a messaging feature, and much more.
For hotel booking apps, particularly useful marketplace components include date pickers for check-in/check-out selection, image carousels for room photos, and map integrations for showing your property location.
Step 5: Preview Your Hotel Room Booking Software
Previewing your hotel room booking software is easy. As we mentioned earlier, press the green "View App" button and select "Staging Preview." You'll see a version of your software appear on the device screen of your choice.
Here's the cool thing about Adalo's preview function: It allows you to click through your software as if it were live. Do this and click through each one of your pages.
Take note of any problems or issues and fix them on the double. Solving problems before you start the publishing process, which we'll talk about in Step 7, can save you time and headaches.
X-Ray, Adalo's performance analysis tool, identifies potential issues before they affect users. Run it before publishing to catch database queries that might slow down your booking flow or components that could impact load times during peak traffic.
Step 6: How To Integrate Payments
Taking payments with Adalo's Stripe integration involves a few straightforward steps. First, go to Stripe's website and create an account.
Then, in your Adalo account, select the "Add Components/Add Screens" button from the Editing Dashboard. Scroll to the Stripe form, drag it to your payments screen, configure your settings, and start getting paid.
For hotel booking software, you'll want to configure Stripe to handle deposits, full payments, and potentially recurring charges for extended stays. The integration supports all standard payment methods guests expect.
Step 7: Web and App Store Publishing
When you build your software with Adalo, you'll be able to publish it on the web, as well as in the Apple App Store and Google Play Stores. Conveniently, you won't need to make separate versions for each platform—Adalo's app-building interface lets you publish the same version of your app on the web and in the app stores.
This single-codebase approach is a significant advantage. Unlike platforms that wrap web apps for mobile (which can introduce performance issues and update delays), Adalo compiles to true native iOS and Android code. Your hotel booking app performs like a native app because it is one.
Publishing your software to the web is quite easy. First, go to your profile in the Horizontal Ribbon. Then, click "Settings" and scroll down to the domain bar. After entering your domain name (www.yourdomain.com), select "Publish" on the Editing Dashboard. After you've completed these steps, your app will be live on Google.
Don't have your domain name? Get one quickly from GoDaddy.com.
Preparing To Publish to the App Stores
Publishing your app on the Apple App Store and Google Play Store takes more time and effort than publishing it on the web. But, the extra effort will pay dividends: Both app stores have over a billion combined monthly visitors.
Prepare for the publishing process with these essential steps:
- Research competitors: Search for similar "hotel booking apps" and analyze their descriptions. Note down commonly used keywords and common features.
- Optimize your description: Use competitor keywords and synonyms like "hotel reservation app" to improve your app's ranking. Keep your description concise, and avoid using the full 4,000-character limit.
- Create an on-brand icon: Ensure your app icon is visually appealing and professional to attract users. Use your existing logo resized or try a tool like Looka to design a memorable icon.
- Include quality screenshots and videos: Use high-quality visuals that showcase key app features, such as booking and payments. Avoid poor-quality images, as they can harm your app's professional appeal.
Now we can start preparing to publish!
How To Publish a Hotel Booking App to the Apple App Store
First, go to Apple's iOS developer page and create an app developer account. Pay the $99 required yearly fee, and sign up for Apple's testing program, Testflight. Apple will allow several testers to download and use your app, and they'll give you feedback. You should implement it to improve your app.
Once you've made the necessary tweaks, return to Adalo, select the "Publish" button, and follow Apple's directions. While Apple's approval process takes a little longer on average than Google's, you could see your app published in as little as a few hours.
Adalo handles the complex submission process—certificates, provisioning profiles, and store guidelines—so you can focus on your app's features rather than wrestling with technical requirements.
Publishing to the Google Play Store
First, navigate to the Android developer account page and create an account. Pay your one-time $25 fee and sign up for Google's app-testing program. This program will invite a select number of testers to download your booking software, test it, and give you feedback.
Allowing third-party testers to try out your app is crucial because these folks will share the user experience. Take their suggestions seriously, and make changes to your app if need be. Doing so can make your app better for real users.
After your app is all dialed in, return to Adalo and press "Publish," following the Android directions. Your app will be up within a few hours to a few days, per Google's average app approval time.
With Adalo's unlimited app updates on paid plans, you can push improvements, new features, and bug fixes to both stores without worrying about republishing limits or additional charges.
How Adalo Compares to Other App Builders for Hotel Booking Software
When evaluating platforms for hotel booking software, several factors matter: native app publishing, database capacity, pricing predictability, and ease of use. Here's how Adalo stacks up against common alternatives:
| Platform | Starting Price | Native iOS/Android | Database Limits | Best For |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Adalo | $36/month | Yes (true native) | Unlimited on paid plans | Web + native mobile apps with app store publishing |
| Bubble | $59/month | Web wrapper only | Limited by Workload Units | Complex web apps with heavy customization |
| Glide | $60/month | No app store publishing | Limited rows, extra charges | Simple spreadsheet-based apps |
| FlutterFlow | $70/month per user | Yes (requires separate database) | External database required | Technical users comfortable with code |
| Softr | $167/month | No app store publishing | Limited per app and datasource | Spreadsheet-based web apps |
Bubble offers more customization options but comes with trade-offs for hotel booking software. Its mobile solution wraps the web app rather than compiling to native code, which can introduce performance issues under load. The Workload Units pricing model makes costs unpredictable as your guest base grows—a concern for seasonal hospitality businesses with traffic spikes.
Glide excels at simple spreadsheet-based apps but lacks app store publishing entirely. For a hotel wanting guests to download their booking app from the App Store or Play Store, this is a dealbreaker.
FlutterFlow is powerful but targets technical users. You'll need to source, set up, and pay for your own database separately—adding complexity and cost. The learning curve is steeper, and many users end up hiring experts to achieve scalability.
For hotel booking software specifically, Adalo's combination of true native compilation, unlimited database records, predictable pricing at $36/month, and streamlined app store publishing makes it the practical choice for hospitality businesses.
Next Steps: Maintaining Your Software, Analytics, and Marketing
After building and publishing your app, it's time to move into "maintenance mode." You'll want to check up on your app daily—if you or any of your users find bugs or crashing screens, fix them immediately. Failure to do so will result in fewer people using your app.
Now, it's time to use the "Analytics" button in Adalo to track your app's users and their locations and figure out which screens are performing the best. Use this to make any necessary changes to your app's screens or cater to a specific demographic.
For hotel booking apps, pay attention to where guests drop off in the booking flow. If many users view room details but don't proceed to booking, consider simplifying that transition or adding more compelling room photos.
To learn effective strategies for marketing your app and increasing downloads, consider reading our app-marketing guide. This guide is a rich source of tips, tricks, and features to help you grow your audience.
Successfully marketing and growing your hotel room booking software is a skill that takes time. But if you put in effort on a daily basis, the chances that you'll attract a healthy stable of users increases.
With Adalo's modular infrastructure supporting apps with over 1 million monthly active users, your booking software can scale from a single property to a hotel chain without requiring a platform migration. The foundation you build today can grow with your hospitality business.
FAQ
| Question | Answer |
|---|---|
| Why choose Adalo over other app building solutions? | Adalo is an AI-powered app builder that creates true native iOS and Android apps from a single codebase. Unlike web wrappers, it compiles to native code and publishes directly to both the Apple App Store and Google Play Store. For hotel booking software, this means guests get a fast, responsive app experience, and you get streamlined publishing without managing separate codebases. |
| What's the fastest way to build and publish an app to the App Store? | Adalo's drag-and-drop interface combined with AI-assisted building through Magic Start and Magic Add lets you go from idea to published app in days rather than months. The platform handles the complex App Store submission process—certificates, provisioning profiles, and guidelines—so you can focus on your hotel booking features instead of technical requirements. |
| Can I easily build hotel room booking software without coding experience? | Yes, Adalo's visual builder has been described as "easy as PowerPoint." You can build professional hotel booking software with room availability, reservations, and payment processing using drag-and-drop components. Magic Start can generate your initial app structure from a simple description of what you need. |
| How long does it take to build a hotel booking app? | With Adalo's templates and AI-assisted features, you can have a functional hotel booking app ready for testing within a few days. The timeline depends on complexity—a basic booking system is faster than one with loyalty programs, room service ordering, and concierge messaging. Publishing to app stores adds a few more days for Apple and Google review. |
| How much does it cost to build hotel booking software with Adalo? | Adalo's paid plans start at $36/month, which includes web and native mobile app publishing, unlimited database records, and unlimited app updates. There are no usage-based charges, so your costs stay predictable even during peak booking seasons. Compare this to alternatives like Bubble ($59/month with usage limits) or FlutterFlow ($70/month per user plus separate database costs). |
| Can I publish my hotel booking app to both the App Store and Google Play? | Yes, Adalo compiles your app to true native iOS and Android code from a single build. You can publish to the Apple App Store, Google Play Store, and the web simultaneously. Updates you make in Adalo push to all platforms, and paid plans include unlimited app updates. |
| What features should a hotel booking app have? | Essential features include room browsing with photos and amenities, availability calendar, secure payment processing (Adalo integrates with Stripe), booking confirmations, and push notifications. Advanced features might include guest messaging, loyalty programs, room service ordering, and local attraction recommendations. Adalo's Marketplace offers components for most of these. |
| How do I integrate payment processing into my hotel booking app? | Adalo offers a built-in Stripe integration. Create a Stripe account, then drag the Stripe form component to your payments screen in Adalo and configure your settings. The integration supports deposits, full payments, and recurring charges for extended stays. |
| Can I use my existing spreadsheet data with Adalo? | Yes, Adalo supports external database connections with Airtable, Google Sheets, and Xano. SheetBridge specifically transforms Google Sheets into a proper database without requiring you to learn database concepts—ideal if you're already tracking room inventory or guest information in spreadsheets. |
| Will my hotel booking app handle high traffic during peak seasons? | Adalo's infrastructure, overhauled with the 3.0 release in late 2025, scales dynamically with your app's needs. The platform supports apps with over 1 million monthly active users. With proper data relationship setups, your booking system handles peak season traffic as smoothly as off-season browsing. |
