NEW YORK, Jan 26 ― Since launching a parallel portal for business travellers last year, Airbnb says more than 50,000 employees from 5,000 companies have eschewed booking a traditional hotel room and used the short-term vacation rental site instead.

Airbnb for Business launched last summer as a dashboard meant to allow companies to coordinate booking processes, streamline payments and offer employees greater accommodation options.

After six months, the company says that, on average, business travellers stayed twice as long on Airbnb and saved on 30 per cent over traditional accommodations.

Nearly half (45 per cent) of business travel booked on the microsite was also international.

Longer stays on Airbnb also point to the growing popularity of “bleisure travel” ― business and leisure ― in which employees tack on vacation days to business trips for mini-vacations.

Here are the top 10 cities for business trips on Airbnb:

1. San Francisco, CA

2. London, UK

3. New York City, NY

4. Paris, France

5. Los Angeles, CA

6. Milan, Italy

7. Mountain View, CA

8. Austin, TX

9. Seattle, WA

10. Tokyo, Japan ― AFP-Relaxnews