Call it Macedonia, F.Y.R.O.M. or Republic of North Macedonia, does anyone here have an experience of surfing there? Mainly looking for the capital Skopje but experiences in other cities are also appreciated. Which platform did you use, was the stay pleasant, anything to be mindful of?

Is anyone facing the same problems when trying to load your feed, messages or just setup? Since a couple of days it just says "wasn't able to load this site. Please come back later". I'm able to login and see my profile but that's basically it.

I tried with different devices, different browsers and even wrote an email to the support which wasn't any helpful.

Yes I do know couchers, trustroots etc. thanks for the advice ;-)

I was a very active member of the community until before the latest updates, having hosted and being hosted by hundreds of members.

With the new scale-like reference system, I don't feel as much like hosting. It makes no sense to me to provide free accommodation and having someone rating their stay like it's a hotel.

Out of hundreds of my references, all of them are positive, and I wonder if I start hosting again, people are now going to rate me under 5 just because they don't like the mattress I provide or they think that I am too quiet or whatever other reason.

For those of you who are still using the app, what's your experience been? Are people likely to not give a top rating and be complaining about minor things?

I have seen (and heard) many people argue that Couchsurfers who complain about the subscription fee are unreasonable, stingy and selfish, considering that they have been staying in people's homes for free for years and are being asked to pay roughly the price of a coffee each month. I'm tired of reading this shaming argument, so I will address it once and for all.

In my opinion, this argument misses the point entirely.

Yes, I'm outraged by Couchsurfing charging a subscription fee, but my objection has nothing to do with the amount of money involved. There are three main reasons why I strongly object to it.

1) Promises are meant to be kept. Period.

If a company promises its service will remain free, it should honour that commitment. It's a matter of honesty and integrity, not how much money users can afford to pay.

By the way, this isn't the only promise Couchsurfing has broken since 2004. Frankly, I'm struggling to recall a promise from this company that it has consistently honoured.

2) We're paying for a service that is getting worse rather than better.

If our subscriptions were being invested in improving the platform and making hospitality exchange easier, more efficient, and more accessible, I would be (slightly) more understanding of the fee.

Instead, the May 2026 redesign removed several useful features directly related to hospitality exchange: response rates, last login information, hosting calendar, etc.. Meanwhile, the Events section has become cluttered with events that have nothing to do with hospitality exchange and aren't even organised by our community.

And I'm just scratching the surface. The list of features that have been removed, degraded, or made unnecessarily complicated is... extensive, to say the least.

3) My objection isn't about paying for hospitality exchange. It's about whom I'm supporting financially.

Like hundreds of other Couchers users, I'm a monthly donor to Couchers, contributing a two-digit amount in USD every month.

I mention this not to boast about how much I donate, but simply to illustrate my point: I'm perfectly happy to contribute financially to a project when I believe in its mission, values, and priorities.

Regarding Couchsurfing's subscription fee, my objection is about the broken promises, the lack of transparency, and the disconnect between Couchsurfing's original ideals and its current priorities.

No, this isn't about money at all. It's about moral values. It's about respect. It's about honesty. It's about the difference between paying for something you believe in and being asked to support a company treating its customers with contempt.

The price is irrelevant when the real issue is integrity.

I suspect some Redditors may ask: "Then why are you still on Couchsurfing?" So let me address that question before it comes up.

The answer is simple: I'm still on Couchsurfing because it gives me an opportunity to introduce people to alternatives they might never have heard of otherwise.

Many Couchsurfers are unaware that platforms such as Couchers, BeWelcome, WarmShowers, and Trustroots exist. By remaining active on Couchsurfing, I can introduce travelers to these alternatives and encourage them to give them a try. Speaking of which, I encourage everyone to do the same.

That way, we can continue helping travelers while encouraging the community to explore alternatives that, in my opinion, deserve far more support.

I'm not staying because I have faith in Couchsurfing as a company. I have none. I'm staying because I still care about the hospitality-exchange community, and that community is bigger than any single platform.

P.S. Apologies for the length of this post. Brevity has never been my strong suit anyway...

I remember Couchsurfing before there was an application that actually had some functionality. It was just some random site where people can message each other and hope to find someone willing to show you around and get you a couch where you can spent a couple of nights in exchange for some interaction. After the recent update I first of all lost complete oversight, was super surprised about what was happening, felt disoriented, kind of overwhelmed and absolutely disappointed!

Hangouts was the BEST functionality for me to meet and hang out with new people while traveling. No matter what someone planned or wanted to do, in good locations there was always smoeone to meet up with or even group of people which then led to some awesome experiences. Now it is tied to events and that makes it soooooo useless! It looses all the spontaneous meetings and happenings that can happen and instead it appears like a weird way to try to organise some event or something... This really disappointed me about the new app.

Just sayin...

I tried to sign up for the first time and this came up

What does it mean.?

And what should I do do ?

I just got a message telling me that my account has been suspended.

I doubt about 2 reasons:

• someone with free account send me a request just to text, he didn't accept the request when I asked him if there's other way to communicate.
• at the same time a girl send me her Instagram directly in the chat, like : here my Instagram @.... (This was the last message I saw)

I don't know why it's my account you get suspended in this way.

Update: they replied to me. This suspension is for 10 days. I got a first warning for duplicated message. But the mail was in my junk box.

CouchSurfing would do anything but implementing actually useful updates.
Today I found this

Who the hell asked for it, when we lack actually useful filters like for dates/number of travellers.

For anyone (like me) wondering which countries still have free access to Couchsurfing, I have just found one: Tunisia.

As we speak, Tunisian members don't need to pay a subscription fee and aren't subject to the usual restrictions on the number of messages they can send or read. Even better, their accounts remain free even if they subsequently change their location to another country.

I wonder whether this has something to do with Tunisia's banking system: Tunisia has strict foreign-exchange controls, and the ability to make international transactions is subject to stringent regulatory restrictions.

Hopefully this post, combined with a good VPN, will trigger a sudden surge in new Couchsurfing accounts registered in Tunisia. You're welcome!

(That said, I can't confirm if newly created Tunisian accounts still enjoy free access. I haven't tested it myself and I won't.)

P.S. If you know any other country where Couchsurfing is still free, please share this info with the rest of us. Thank you. As far as I know, Couchsurfing has never published any "list of free countries". Rather surprising, considering Couchsurfing's well-established reputation for transparency and honesty, right?

EDIT: Just to clarify, I'm obviously not suggesting that hosts should misrepresent their location. If you're hosting, people need to be able to find you where you actually live. That should go without saying, but since a couple of comments have raised the issue, then... well... I thought I would spell it out.

Personally, I only host on Couchsurfing. I have never surfed, and I have no intention of doing so, so I cannot lie about my location.

That said, I have hosted Couchsurfers who had deliberately set their location to another country to avoid paying the subscription fee. For example, I once hosted someone from China whose profile location was set to Nepal. Did it bother me? Not in the slightest. It wasn't a deal-breaker, and I had no interest in policing someone else's decision.

Over the years, I have also hosted people who told me they were overstaying their visas for a few days, regularly using recreational drugs, or had criminal records. None of those things made me unwilling to host them.

People make their own decisions, and I'm not Couchsurfing's compliance officer. If someone wants to find a workaround for a subscription fee that the platform's management once promised would never become a requirement, that's their business. Other people are perfectly entitled to disagree, and I'm not asking anyone to change their location.

My original post was simply about identifying countries where Couchsurfing is still accessible for free (which is a question that has been raised several times here), and sharing that information with the community. What people choose to do with it is entirely up to them. Who are we to judge them anyway?

I apologize for insisting on this point, but let's not lose sight of the bigger picture: if Couchsurfing hadn't broken its promises in the first place, we wouldn't be having this discussion about subscription fees at all.

I hosted my first Couchsurfer in 2003 (via CS's predecessor The Hospitality Club), and was a part of building the CS community -- we had radical goals: completely free travel, cultural exchange, friendship, and building world peace!  (A relic of the old listserv still exists at hospitalityclub.org.)

Since those first days, I've always insisted having a brief video meeting (then, via Skype; now, WhatsApp) with potential surfers so that we could get to know one another a bit better and I could give them a video tour of my home.  I also send a short pdf guide to staying at my apartment along with a few useful tips about visiting NYC.  It's something my surfers have always thanked me for!  

Today, I received an email from Couchsurfing announcing that any contact outside of the app is now forbidden, and that my account could be suspended!  I'm convinced that greater communication, including video chat, actually increases the safety and comfort of surfers and hosts.  

I helped to create the original guidelines, in which we actually encouraged outside communication for these exact purposes!  Couchsurfing wouldn't exist at all if it weren't for old-timers like me, and our rules were simple: NO MONEY, no spam, no exchange of services (i.e. sex), and please write a reference.  These simple rules kept the community extraordinarily safe for 25+ years

I plan to disobey and continue asking potential surfers to contact me for a video chat and greater information exchange, as I always have.  I strongly object to this rule.

-Shawn from NYC

After a little less than a decade on Couchsurfing, I’m genuinely astonished by some of the requests I receive. What surprises me even more is that these people somehow keep finding hosts.

At what point did basic etiquette, social awareness, reciprocity become optional?

Maybe a community built on generosity actually needs a little exclusivity, to preserve what makes it special.

“I’m excited to explore your city!” So is everyone at the airport.

“I love meeting new people!” Congratulations on possessing a trait shared by half the population.

“Would love to share stories from my travels!” Is that a threat? I’m busy that day.

“I hope you can host me!” And I hope you can develop a personality before your next request.

At what point did we collectively decide that expressing an interest in travel qualifies someone to be welcomed into a stranger’s home?

The bar is in hell, I fear.

Hi everyone! I’m a college student currently doing a small research project on Couchsurfing and digital platforms.

I’ve been reading through this subreddit and noticed quite a few discussions about the recent Couchsurfing redesign/update, especially from long-term users. I’d really love to hear more about how people here actually experienced these changes.

If you used Couchsurfing both before and after the update:

What changed for you? What specifically do you dislike about the new version, and why?

I’m also interested in the opposite question: are there any features, old or new, that you think work particularly well? What features actually make Couchsurfing useful, enjoyable, or different from other travel/social platforms for you?

I’m especially curious about small things that might not seem important at first: profiles, references, search, messaging, the way you find hosts/guests, how people present themselves, or how you decide whether someone seems trustworthy.

I’m not affiliated with Couchsurfing and I’m not trying to evaluate whether the redesign is objectively “good” or “bad”. I’m interested in how the platform’s design affects the way people actually use it and interact with each other.

Would love to hear your experiences, especially if you’ve been using Couchsurfing for a long time!

Thank you so so much

Hey everyone!

I’m planning my first trip to Europe and will be backpacking across the continent for a few months. I’ve travelled to around 50 countries so far, but most of my accommodation experience has been with hostels, hotels and Airbnbs.

I’ve used Couchsurfing occasionally in different countries, but I’ve never used it extensively as most backpackers do.

I’m wondering how safe and reliable Couchsurfing is in Europe, especially when travelling solo for an extended period. I’d love to experience local culture, meet interesting people and hear perspectives from locals rather than just sticking to the usual tourist experience.

A few questions for experienced Couchsurfers:

How safe has Couchsurfing been for you in Europe?

Are there any particular countries or cities where it works especially well, or where you’d be more cautious?

What red flags should I look for when choosing a host?

Is it generally easy to find hosts, or has the platform become less active in recent years?

Are there any alternative platforms or tips you’d recommend for a long backpacking trip?

I’m not looking to use it just to save money. I’m more interested in the cultural exchange and meet local people I might meet along the way.

Would really appreciate advice from people who have actually used Couchsurfing across Europe, especially those who have travelled for several months.

Thanks in advance! 😊

I want to share an alarming pattern I’ve experienced regarding how Couchsurfing handles moderation, Terms of Service (ToS) enforcement, and automated censorship.

​Over the past few weeks, I encountered a situation where a user left a reference on a host’s profile that explicitly compared the home to a "concentration camp" and weaponized severe personal and mental health insults (accusing the host of severe OCD alongside sarcastic attacks).

​Naturally, I reported this violation to support. Here is what happened next:

​Support ignored the report & enabled ToS bypassing: Instead of penalizing or banning the account for hate speech and harassment, support completely ignored the ticket. Worse, the platform allowed the user to quietly edit the reference after the fact, directly violating Couchsurfing's explicit policy stating that published references are permanent and non editable.

​Automated AI censorship: Meanwhile, when I attempted to update my own profile bio to include constructive criticism about platform safety and moderation policies, Couchsurfing's automated AI filters aggressively and instantly flagged, blocked, and censored my text.

​The double standard:

The platform relies on automated AI surveillance to instantly silence users who criticize their infrastructure or policies, yet human support teams protect or ignore users who post hate speech, trivialize concentration camps, and violate their own core reference rules.

​I gave executive leadership and support weeks to audit this support failure and address why basic ToS rules are being bypassed to shield offensive behavior. They completely ignored the communication.

​I have screenshots of the original unedited reference, the illegally modified reference text, the ignored support tickets. If a platform wants to market itself on a "trust network," it cannot use AI to suppress user feedback while giving a free pass to targeted harassment.

​Has anyone else experienced this kind of automated overreach paired with complete silence from trust & safety?

Edit: since it isn't clear apparently, I was neither the host nor guest here. These seemingly entitled parents sent a request to me, and I noticed the discrepancies when looking at their references.

Why?
What is the point of it ? What is the benefit ?

also, for most people using CS, this filter will be functionally useless. e.g. for me (30+ references) the amount of hosts I've seen that has a connection with me is well under 1%, so it filters out almost no one

Would it not make a LOT more sense an "In Network" filter?
Someone that hosted a friend of mines before
So I can ask my friends about certain hosts and make sure the host is awesome,safe,etc...

And then also "In Network" filter would actually functionally do something

I recently stayed with a male Couchsurfing host, and honestly, the stay itself was totally fine.

He prepared a separate room for me, showed me around, helped me get settled, and I had no issues with him while I was actually staying there. Nothing felt weird or uncomfortable at the time.

At one point during the one night stay I actually FaceTimed my boyfriend and introduced them. They actually had a whole conversation - my host gave my boyfriend career advice and even invited him to come visit sometime. So yes, he was VERY aware that I had a boyfriend that I love…

Anyways, I left to visit another city, and later I messaged the host about possibly coming back and staying another night.

That’s when things changed.

He told me he had “something important” to tell me and then sent me a romantic message over WhatsApp that really could not have been misunderstood. He told me I was the kind of girl he had been looking for, that I had walked into his heart, that he felt a connection with me, wanted to know if I felt the same, and said he wanted to be honest about his feelings.

Again - this is after literally chatting with my boyfriend, giving him career advice, and inviting him to visit… the AUDACITY. How can you even do that?!

So I made other arrangements and stayed with another host.

I waited until I had completely left the city before leaving a reference because I didn’t want to create an awkward situation while I was still nearby. I tried to make the reference as fair as possible. I mentioned the positive parts of the stay and the things he did for me, but I also mentioned what happened afterward because I felt like other women should know before deciding whether they want to stay with him.

I also unfortunately couldn’t include every detail because Couchsurfing has a character limit for references, so I had to summarize the situation quite a bit which removed key details that would have made the situation even more clear.

I’ll attach screenshots of the WhatsApp conversation so people can see exactly what he said.

The problem is that he then responded publicly to my reference saying there were “no romantic intentions” and framing everything as basically a cultural misunderstanding… as if I don’t know what habibi means or how’s it used 🙄

So now his response makes it sound like I somehow misread an innocent interaction, which I feel completely undermines the reason I left the reference in the first place. I left this reference so that other women wouldn’t have to experience being in an uncomfortable situation with their host.

So now I’m wondering what I can actually do…has anyone dealt with something like this before?

I of course already went ahead and blocked him on WhatsApp and Couchsurfing… he blocked me as well so I had to ask a friend to take a screenshot of what he wrote in response since I couldn’t view it.

Is this something worth reporting to Couchsurfing Trust & Safety and sending them the WhatsApp screenshots? Can they do anything when someone responds to a reference in a way that directly contradicts the actual messages?

Any advice or insights would help for how to handle this situation - thanks!

I'm just curious. My hosting days are over, but I browse this sub and see most people talking about their "after-host" experience are women. Sadly, I see that many of those experiences are negative/creeper issues so I know they face some safety issues. The posts about having zero luck finding hosts are almost always from men.

When I was hosting, I think I hosted about 5 men, 2 women, and 2 couples. I preferred hosting men because it seemed a little easier. However, I did get tons of messages from attractive women (I'm in LA) that were basically completely empty requests aside from "hey, I'm in LA rn, is your couch available?" I assume they have to put in no effort because they have a million options. I'm just wondering if it really is that easy to find places.

Hey Guys,

it’s my first time using CS about a month or so. Years back my roommate (Germany) was using CS frequently and we had a lot of fun, kind and nice people at our shared flat staying with us. Loaded with good memories on that time, I started CS as well and wrote several people in NYC. I am doing an east coast trip and stay 6 nights in NYC. Therefore, I would like to experience the city and especially the people. My plan: max. stay of 2 nights per person.

I read the references, always had custom DMs and requests used the “shortly active” filter. But my responses are almost 0.

I habe no references yet, but a filled profile and also included in the messages that for a second proof of a real person they could add me on IG or have a look on my LinkedIn.

So am I the problem or do people just hate to respond?

I’ve hosted a few people a couple of times, but now they’re coming back to my city every month or two and asking to stay again.

At some point it stops feeling like Couchsurfing and starts feeling like I’m their regular free accommodation especially when they never host anyone themselves.

Anyone else had this?

I am in a reasonably sized city. I got a request for a hangout from someone who was surprised that I was in the city nearby and not the city they were in. They had also joined a hangout with another person that was also in my city, but even further from him. We didn't hangout since we're not close to each other. That was yesterday.

Today I was looking at the map and I'm showing as being a few km away from where I actually am (but not enough to appear in a different city). It's showing me as being in a hiking area that I was at more than 24h ago. It's also showing the hangout with the other two guys that was started more than a day ago. It shows both of their profiles. But then it shows the solo profile of the guy who made the hangout as being in the neighbouring city, but when you click on it, it shows as being a deleted user.

So at this point it seems that nothing about hangouts can be trusted. My location is not updating after more than a full day. Is my location showing to others the same as I see? Are their locations accurate? Are hangouts perpetually active?

Hangouts is all I ever used CS for and it seems like it might be completely broken along with everything else.

I see "Very Likely to Recommend" etc attached to some references, but when I leave a reference, I don't have that option.

This is for a guest who stayed months ago (I'm just catching up on references now) and I can't remember if we confirmed the stay through the site – maybe that's the issue?

Any suggestions

I came across a comment from u/Neat-Coconut6892 asking another Reddit user: “What would make you happy with the platform?”

So I thought I would make a list of things that would make me happy. Who knows? Maybe Mike will read this and implement some of them.

(Yes, I know, I know: I'm a dreamer...)

Anyway, here's my list (in random order). Please feel free to add your own suggestions in the comments. If I like them, I'll edit the list accordingly.

• Be transparent about the actual number of active users, as Couchers and BeWelcome are.
• Remove the enoooooormous number of inactive accounts (as Couchers and BeWelcome do).
• Define what “recently” actually means in “recently active”. How recent is “recently”? Last week? Last month? 2 years ago?
• ... Or, even better, restore the “last login” information. (By the way, we all know why they removed it...)
• Restore the response rate, which was a crucial piece of information for Couchsurfers looking for a host.
• Stop treating every user as an active host by default, including people who haven't logged in for years.
• Display accurate numbers for hosts’ references and friends. The “Your Stays / Find locals to stay with” section of the home page should show the actual number of references and friends a host has. The figures displayed in this section are significantly inflated (roughly twice the real numbers).
• Clearly state which countries are still free to use Couchsurfing (if any) and which ones require a subscription.
• Restore the Hosting Calendar.
• Remove the absurd character limits on both hosting requests and replies.
• Fix the photo-display problems introduced by the latest redesign.
• Replace the useless “Out of Network” filter with an “In your Network” filter.
• Show members’ actual age, or let them hide it. Replace vague age ranges such as “35–45” with the member’s actual age, while allowing people who prefer not to disclose it to leave the field blank.
• Remove the absurd 24-hour delay before references can be left. Hosts and guests should be able to leave a reference immediately after a stay ends, while the experience is still fresh in everyone’s memory. (By the way, the previous design allowed this, as do other hospitality-exchange platforms...)
• Make replies to references permanently uneditable. Allowing users to rewrite their replies indefinitely undermines transparency and accountability, especially when other members rely on those replies to assess someone's character.
• Bring back the ability to attach a sentiment to a personal reference. Personal references are now "sentiment-free", which means members can no longer explicitly indicate whether a hangout experience was positive, neutral or negative, which can be problematic in serious situations such as harassment.
• Introduce a private post-stay feedback system for hosts and guests (like Couchers): it would allow both parties to rate their experience after a stay, for example on a scale of 1 to 10, through a confidential feedback form accessible only to Couchsurfing staff.
• Restore the lovely world map that used to display the current location of our previous guests and hosts. It was one of the most charming features of the old Couchsurfing design.
• Stop forcing users to create a “public trip” in order to send a hosting request. Publishing a "public trip" should be an explicit, voluntary choice, and not an accidental side effect of sending a couch request.
• Only post "public trips" with precise travel dates. Knowing that someone plans to visit a city “sometime next month” is not really useful to hosts.
• Stop promoting Couchsurfing as a dating/hookup opportunity. Advertising the possibility of finding love on the platform attracts the wrong crowd.
• Start treating the community with respect (as Couchers and BeWelcome do).
• Stop creating fake profiles for promotional material.
• Get rid of the event database used to populate "fake" events that nobody on CS has organized.
• Fix the numerous bugs that still affect the platform, including issues such as the one u/CyberLeekForever posted about a few days ago.
• If someone is banned without prior warning, have the basic courtesy to explain why.

Obviously, this list is far from exhaustive. I'm probably forgetting many things...

Mike, if you're reading this (and haven't been fired yet): here's your free product-development roadmap. You're welcome.

like changing location, regularly hosting, something, anything, i don't know. anything?