Malta Airbnbs — Licensed vs Unlicensed

In Malta everyone knows that most Airbnbs are unlicensed — including the Government and the Malta Tourism Authority (MTA). Nonetheless enforcement is non-existent and these are allowed to operate illegally year after year. This project aims to map the extent of this abuse.

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of Maltese short-term rentals have no nearby HFP licence

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Read the methodology and caveats

MTA-licensed (Short-Let Rented Accommodation)

– Pinned on the actual street

– Pinned on locality (street unfindable)

– Short-let records

Airbnb listings (Inside Airbnb snapshot)

⚠️ The Airbnb data is a community-scraped snapshot with limited information. The license field is almost always blank, so matching is by proximity + bedroom count only — not by licence ID. Each licence is paired with at most one listing (otherwise a building with 1 licence and 10 Airbnb flats would show all 10 as "matched"), so the matched listing isn't necessarily the licensed flat — just the closest plausible candidate. Counts are indicative, not authoritative.

– Matches a licensed property nearby

– No nearby licence found

– Short-stay Airbnb listings

Worst localities by unmatched ratio

Localities with at least 100 short-stay listings, ranked by the share that could not be paired with a nearby HFP licence.

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Largest unmatched hosts

Hosts ranked by Airbnb listings that could not be paired with a nearby HFP licence. This is a lead list from the proximity model, not a legal finding.

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Tourist carrying capacity by town

Airbnb sleep capacity from each listing's accommodates field, ranked against NSO 2024 resident population. Resident density is shown for context.

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Layers

🟢 Licensed (accurate to street-level) 🟠 Licensed (accurate to locality only) 🔵 Airbnb — matched to a licence 🔴 Airbnb — no nearby licence

Filters

Locality Search licence ref / name / street / host