Airbnb often is discussed in terms of its present or future impacts on hotels. The purpose of this research was to investigate such impacts by determining the extent to which Airbnb is used as a hotel substitute and by examining how Airbnb guests expect their accommodations to perform relative to hotels. Together, these analyses were intended to provide empirical insight into Airbnb’s status as a disruptive innovation. The study involved an online survey of over 800 tourists who had used Airbnb within the previous year. About two-thirds had used Airbnb as a hotel substitute. When considering traditional hotel attributes (e.g., cleanliness and comfort), Airbnb was generally expected to outperform budget hotels/motels, underperform upscale hotels, and have mixed outcomes versus mid-range hotels, signalling some – but not complete – consistency with the concept of disruptive innovation. The findings have important practical and theoretical implications.