Content & Community Guidelines

At Tripadvisor, our mission is to help you to find the good out there, wherever it is in the world. We are proud to host contributions from millions of travelers, giving people a platform to guide and inspire others every day. We also recognize how important it is that our platform provides a safe environment for everyone in the travel community, and that the contributions on our site provide useful and relevant guidance that helps travelers plan their trips.

That’s why we developed and spent more than 20 years refining our Community Guidelines. In addition to our general community guidelines, different types of content on our site have additional guidelines specific to that content type.

Last updated on October 2, 2023

Sexually explicit content:

We will not post content that contains sexually explicit material, except in the following instances:

Lifestyle resort experiences: Tripadvisor understands that some of our users travel to specific lifestyle resorts to engage in adult activity and, for such locations, we may allow an innuendo that alludes to a sexual experience, but we don't allow graphic or explicit description of such experiences even if directly relevant to understanding the travel experience at those resorts.

Eye-witness accounts: If you witness explicit sexual activity and recounting it is relevant to your experience and the experience other travelers may have in the future, we may post the content as long as the commentary is not excessively graphic.

Reports of non-consensual sex activity: In this scenario, we reserve the right to host content that some may consider graphic or extreme in order to ensure travelers are informed about an event(s) that may compromise traveler safety.

Violence:

We are an inclusive community and want our users to feel welcome and safe when visiting our app or website. Please do not include language that expresses intent or inclination to harm specific person(s) or property(s), encourages others to do the same, or conveys a desire for such actions to occur.

Content that specifically mentions that people should be shot, killed, strangled, assaulted, or harmed in any way - even if used as sarcasm or stated in an exaggerated manner - will be removed. Content that glorifies structural harm to a property, such as threats of bombing or fires, will be removed. Content containing the above types of threats may be reported to law enforcement.


We will not publish content that promotes or describes personal participation in criminal activity that is illegal in the country of the property, establishment or location being written about . We reserve the right to report to the authorities any instances brought to our attention of child endangerment, human trafficking or imminent threats to a person or property.

In addition, we will remove any content that mentions:

  • A user’s or travel companion’s participation in prostitution, even if legal in the city or country where activity takes place
  • Participation in non-prescription drug use, including requests to purchase, obtain or smuggle drugs, with the exception of content that describes the personal use of alcohol or marijuana. Tripadvisor does not condone the use of illegal substances.
  • Participation in the illegal distribution of weapons or firearms.

Contributors can include eye-witness accounts of criminal activity, including, but not limited to, staff participation in drugs, violence, robberies, and sexual assaults. Such context should not glorify violent or illegal activity but is included to be helpful to future travelers.

Tripadvisor does not actively monitor content that discusses circumventing property rules or guidelines such as trespassing or refusing to pay an entrance fee and will allow these to remain on the site.


Keep it clean! We request that contributors refrain from using vulgar or profane terms. Of course, we don’t allow the “super profane” words and our general rule of thumb is, if you wouldn’t shout it in public, don’t say it here. In some cultures terms may not be seen as problematic while in another culture that same term could be seen as extremely offensive. We are a global platform, so if a term is found generally held to be extremely offensive in the context used in any geography, we may remove that content for the sake of our global community.

We ask our community to use the medical or anatomically correct term when referencing body parts or bodily functions. We may choose to publish slang or more colloquial terms on a case-by-case basis.

We allow emojis, acronyms and veiled profanities as long as they are not offensive, particularly when aimed at an individual.

We reserve the right to allow language that might otherwise be considered offensive when we believe it's necessary to convey important information to our travel community. This could include recounting an experience with a property representative or other guests that may be relevant and informative to other travelers


We do not allow contributions that promote any service or product offered by the contributor. With the exception of certain management functions provided to listed businesses, we do not host content that is included primarily for commercial reasons. If you post content to promote your own business, such as a tour provider or packaged goods company, the review will be removed.

We reserve the right to reject any website link or content that is deemed promotional or irrelevant such as blogs, news articles, social media references and contact information. Website links may be allowed when relevant and helpful to the travel experience and not promotional in nature. For example, the site used to book a tour reservation at a specific museum could be helpful to travelers.

We do not allow advertisements or solicitations, including website links, with referrer tags or affiliate codes.


Content posted to Tripadvisor is available publicly and may be visible in general internet search results. As such, we strongly discourage you from sharing your own private information in any content you submit. This includes passwords, email addresses, loyalty and frequent flyer numbers, your full name, your home address, other personally identifying information, or anything else you do not want shared publicly. That said, we will not remove content because a contributor has chosen to include such information, but can remove it upon a direct request from that contributor.

We will remove content that contains information posted by businesses or other travelers that is private or confidential information such as wifi passcodes, door codes, email addresses that are not publicly available, social media contact information, loyalty/frequent flyer numbers, and credit card numbers.

We do not allow users to post content containing the full names (including last or surnames) of other individuals. Exceptions to this may be:

  • Employees of the business you are writing about that are commonly referred to at the business with their last/surname or have electively participated in social media platforms with their full name and place of employment;
  • The name of the business is inclusive of the surname of the employee named;
  • Executive-level employees;
  • Property owners/managers;
  • Celebrities;
  • Any employees of a property who respond to reviews on Tripadvisor using their last/surname; or
  • The full names of public professionals such as doctors, lawyers, etc.

Property Owners: we will remove management responses if they contain any information that personally identifies the author and/or other guests if such information is not readily available in the content you are responding to. For example, a guest’s full name, medical information or travel itinerary.

Special note on Escape Room-type experiences or similar experiences that have an element of surprise: Don’t ruin it for future travelers by giving away secret information about the experience! If you do without explicitly letting travelers know about a spoiler alert, we may remove your post and ask you to submit an updated one without that information.


We want you to share your best, most accurate travel advice and tips with our community— just make sure any content you submit is yours! There should be no extensive quoted material from other sources. Any content plagiarized or copied from other websites, reviewers/travelers, property owners, emails, or printed materials that was not written by you will be removed.

Review content generated by artificial intelligence (AI) is not permitted and a violation of Tripadvisor guidelines. Users found to be submitting AI-generated text and/or images to the site may be banned, in addition to having their content removed.


Tripadvisor will not host any content that promotes intolerance for, contains offensive stereotypes of, or incites hatred/bias towards people based on their ethnic or social origin, race, gender, gender identity, gender expression, sexual orientation, religious/spiritual beliefs, socioeconomic class, physical or mental ability, immigration status, or nationality. If the text is not explicit, we will lean towards removing any such content that could be perceived as expressing bias or hatred even if not necessarily intended that way. Certain terms may not be considered problematic, while in another culture that same term could be seen as extremely offensive. We are a global platform leveraged across geographies and if a term is found offensive in any geography, when used to convey the same meaning, we will remove it for the sake of our global community.

We recognize that, in some places, local laws and regulations may require businesses to alter or adjust the service they provide to individuals based on a person’s race, gender identity or orientation, religion, sexual preference, or nationality. We encourage travelers who experience such a scenario to post honest, first-hand accounts of their experience, and we respect their right to criticize or condemn any discriminatory practices they may encounter at a business, even where those practices may fall in line with local laws or regulations.


Be nice! No personal insults or other unnecessary and derogatory commentary about other individuals.

Tripadvisor is not the place to promote your favorite political candidate or cause you support. We appreciate your passion, but unlike other websites that allow users to post about anything they want, the Tripadvisor platform is focused on travel experiences. Any substantial comments on political or religious preferences, ethics, or wider social issues that are not relevant to travel or incite non-travel related discussions on our platform will be removed.

Given that we are a global travel platform and help people around the world, we understand at times you might want to write in a language that is not your native language. We advise you not to use a machine to translate because often the text can be garbled and the original intent is missing. If a machine was used to translate and the content is difficult to understand, we may remove it. Please make sure your posting is using the correct alphabet for languages we support as when not used, it can make content hard to read.

Do not use HTML tags or type in ALL CAPS.