You booked a hotel. Now you want to know if the price drops before your trip. The problem isn't whether prices drop (they do, on 40 to 57 percent of bookings). The problem is that nobody has time to check hotel prices every day for weeks.
Here's every way to automate that check, from free methods that take five minutes to dedicated tools that run in the background.
Why tracking after booking matters
Most people compare prices before they book. Once the booking is confirmed, they stop looking. That makes sense. You've got a room, it's done.
But hotel prices aren't fixed. They move constantly. Hotels adjust rates hundreds of times a day based on occupancy, events, competitor pricing, and how far out the check-in date is. A room that cost you one price when you booked might be significantly cheaper three weeks later because a group booking cancelled or occupancy projections shifted.
If you booked a refundable rate, you can cancel the original and rebook at the lower price. The savings are real. But you have to know the price dropped, and you have to act before your cancellation deadline closes.
That's the window. Price drop + time to act = savings. Miss either one and the opportunity is gone.
Method 1: Google Hotels price tracking
Google Hotels has a "Track prices" toggle that sends you email alerts when rates change for a specific hotel and date range.
How to set it up:
- Search for your hotel on Google Hotels (or Google Search, then click the hotel result)
- Enter your dates
- Toggle "Track prices" on
What's good: Free. Takes 30 seconds. Google checks multiple booking sites.
What's missing: Google's tracking is pre-booking. It monitors a hotel search, not your specific booking. It doesn't know your cancellation deadline, doesn't know what you paid, and can't tell you whether a rate drop is on a refundable or non-refundable room. You get a notification that rates changed, but you still have to figure out whether it matters for your situation.
It also won't compare the new rate to your original booking price. You'll need to remember what you paid and do the math yourself.
Method 2: Calendar reminders (the manual way)
The low-tech version that actually works, as long as you don't have too many bookings.
How to set it up:
- When you book, add two calendar events: one for the cancellation deadline and one reminder 3 to 5 days before it
- When the reminder fires, check the current price on Google Hotels and the site where you booked
- If the rate is lower, rebook at the new price and cancel the original
What's good: Free. No tools needed. You control the timing.
What's missing: You're checking once. Hotel prices move daily, so a single check might miss the lowest point entirely. If you have three or four upcoming bookings, that's three or four manual checks to manage. It also takes about 10 minutes per booking per check, which adds up if you travel frequently.
This method works for the occasional trip. It breaks down for anyone managing more than a couple of bookings at a time.
Method 3: Dedicated price tracking tools
These services are built specifically for post-booking hotel price monitoring. You forward your confirmation email, they parse the booking details, and they check prices daily until your check-in date.
Pruvo
The most established name in this space. Forward your confirmation email to Pruvo (or connect your Gmail account), and they monitor prices across their partner OTAs. When a rate drops, you get an email with a link to rebook through one of Pruvo's affiliate partners.
Pruvo is free. The trade-off is that it only surfaces rates from partner OTAs, which means it might miss a lower rate on a non-partner site. And it doesn't track your cancellation deadline. You'll get a price drop alert but won't know at a glance whether you can still act on it.
HotelSlash
From the team behind AutoSlash (which has tracked car rental prices since 2010). Forward your confirmation to save@hotelslash.com and they monitor across 50+ booking sites. Alerts come within 10 minutes of detecting a drop.
HotelSlash is a paid annual subscription. The paid model means they aren't limited to affiliate partners for rate coverage. Like Pruvo, they don't track cancellation deadlines.
StayHawk
StayHawk monitors prices and cancellation deadlines together. Forward your confirmation email (or import a booking with the Chrome extension), and it parses the hotel, dates, rate, and cancellation deadline. It checks prices daily across multiple sources and alerts you when a cheaper rate is available while you still have time to cancel and rebook.
The free tier tracks up to 5 bookings with deadline alerts (no price monitoring). The Pro plan adds price monitoring for up to 30 bookings. There's also an agency plan for travel professionals managing client bookings across a team workspace.
The thing that's different about StayHawk is the deadline connection. A price drop alert tells you something is cheaper. A price drop alert with "your cancellation window closes in 4 days" tells you to do something about it now.
Method 4: Browser extensions
RatePunk
A browser extension (Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Opera, Edge) that shows rate comparisons when you visit hotel booking pages. More useful for pre-booking comparison shopping, but you can revisit a hotel page after booking to see if rates changed.
The limitation is that you have to actively visit the page. There's no background monitoring or alerts.
StayHawk Chrome extension
Imports booking details directly from hotel and OTA websites into your StayHawk dashboard. This is an ingestion method (an alternative to email forwarding), not a standalone price tracker. Once imported, StayHawk handles the daily monitoring.
Which method to use
For one or two bookings a year, the calendar reminder method is fine. Set it up in 2 minutes and check manually before your deadline.
For frequent travellers with multiple active bookings, a dedicated tool saves real time and catches drops you'd miss with manual checks. The choice comes down to what you care about:
- Price monitoring only: Pruvo (free) or HotelSlash (paid) both work
- Price monitoring + deadline tracking: StayHawk is the only option that connects both
- Business travel or agency use: StayHawk's agency plan handles team workspaces with multiple agents and hundreds of bookings
If you book a lot of hotels for work and want to automate price rechecking without breaking policy, the workflow is simple: get alerted to a drop, check the cancellation window, rebook within policy, done.
Frequently asked questions
Can I automatically recheck hotel prices after booking? Yes. Dedicated tools like StayHawk, Pruvo, and HotelSlash check hotel prices daily after you forward your confirmation email. Google Hotels can also track prices for a specific hotel and date range, though it doesn't know your booking details.
How does hotel price tracking work? You forward your booking confirmation email to a tracking service (or import via browser extension). The service parses your hotel, dates, and rate. It then checks prices daily across booking sites and alerts you by email or push notification when the rate drops below what you paid.
Is it worth paying for a hotel price tracker? If you book more than a few hotels a year, the math usually works. One successful rebook typically covers a full year of any tracking tool.
Can I track hotel prices for business travel? Yes. StayHawk's agency plan is built for professionals managing multiple bookings. It supports team workspaces where admins see all bookings and agents see their own clients. Automated price alerts mean you don't have to manually recheck each booking.
Forward your confirmation email to StayHawk and get alerted to price drops before your cancellation window closes. Start tracking for free — no credit card required.