The 11 Types of Travelers that You'll Meet in a Hostel

Staying at a hostel is a great way to meet fellow travelers, save some money, and gauge how your hygiene habits stack up against your peers. I've been staying in hostels since 2014, and I can say that no matter the continent I'm in or the quality of the accommodation, I keep running into these 13 types of hostel-goers. They are each, in their own, way ubiquitous to the hostel scene, and once you've spent a dozen or so nights in hostels, each type of traveler begins to provide a strange sense of familiarity among these strangers you've never met before.

The Australian

The Australian is the backbone of the hostel experience, which is why they come first on this list. Australians make up about 0.3% of the world's population, but for some odd reason they comprise about 20% of people you'll ever see in a hostel. I don't know why, I don't make the rules. Built like a tank, the Australian has traveled for 51 hours with two overnight layovers to sample every type of beer ever brewed from Hazy Double IPAs to trappist ales to Coors Light. Just kidding, they don't drink anything less than 7% ABV. And despite being halfway around the world from their homeland, the Australian is still living as if they haven't left the Australian Eastern Daylight Time zone, going to sleep at 7am and rising at 3pm with the worst hangover they've had since last week.

The Solo Traveler Who's Been Literally Everywhere

You've never been to a single place on Earth this guy hasn't been to. He's been to countries you've never even heard of, multiple times. The town that you grew up in? He was there last summer. That little beach 20 miles south of Budva in Montenegro that you found by mistake after you took a wrong turn in your rental car? He was there last week and is making plans to go back next month (his best friend's dad sells priganice to tourists there on the weekends). Somehow, this guy has enough money at age 26 that he's been on vacation for the past 3 years, yet has still opted for the 24-bed mixed dorm that goes for €9 a night. He can order a drink in 13 languages, can ask where the bathroom is in 11, but words of humility are not in his vocabulary.

The Guest Who Doesn't Speak One Word of English

You asked in your slowest and clearest English where she's from, and you're not sure if she responded that she's from Deutschland or is Dutch. She is seemingly happy to play a card game in the common room based on facial expressions alone, but don't try to explain the rules to her without first taking out your Google Translate app. Does she have a friend with her that speaks English? We are not sure. Is she the cleaning lady? We are not sure. Is she being human-trafficked by the Australian? Probably not, but we are not sure.

The First-Time Abroad American

You can tell there's an American nearby because you can hear their voice from one of the other rooms before you've even seen them. She's loudly explaining how this was supposed to be a high school graduation trip to London before college, but her parents insisted on coming along (they are staying in the Premier Inn London Hackney a few tube stops away). She will point out absolutely every single thing that is different in England than America ("I have the funniest story, oh my gosh, they told me my room was on Floor 1, but then said I had to go up the stairs!") And when you ask her where she's from, she makes sure to specify Georgia, UNITED STATES, not the Georgia in Eastern Europe (because the valley girl accent didn't make it obvious).

The Photographer

Yeah, we didn't really want this night to be documented and posted on a public social media channel, but you weren't really given the chance to say no. Whether using an iPhone, an SLR, or a Polaroid camera, it doesn't really matter; the Photographer wants this evening that you won't remember to be one that she will cherish through the assistance of photographic evidence, perhaps even a few videos to go along. She's promised she would get your WhatsApp at some point to send the pictures to you, but she will forget and be on a Flixbus to Nice before you wake up.

The Traveler Winging it Even More than Normal

This person is either the worst trip planner of all time, or has literally zero understanding of European geography. Put aside the fact that she didn't realize that she had to book tours of the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp ahead of time, and so she booked the only available tour which is offered in Polish ("I'll just nod and pretend I understand!"). Her 4-month long itinerary looks like a spiderweb. Rome, to Dublin, back to Rome, down to Naples, back to Rome, out to Manchester, down to Milan, back to London… did she realize there was a better order to do things?

The One-Nighter

He is here for a good time, not a long time (and has already changed his dating app bio to reflect this). His plan was to check in at 7pm and take a 5am Ryanair flight out the next morning, but he still wants to see the sights, get some street food, and "go to a bar before this other bar before going to the club I heard was worth the €14 cover charge". He's not actually going to sleep tonight, and he booked the hostel just because it was a tiny bit cheaper than the price for luggage storage. Despite talking to him for a total of 25 seconds, he will insist that he can get your Instagram so he can hit you up in case he ever happens to be passing through your hometown of Dubuque.

The Guy That Became an Employee

He was originally only supposed to spend 4 nights, but he's been here for 7 months, which is longer than anyone else that works at the hostel except for the cleaning crew. He won't tell you his real name in case immigration authorities raid the hostel looking for him. He doesn't actually make a salary, but as long as he tries to upsell guests on the pub crawl ("Only €24 and it comes with a free shot!") and makes a half-assed attempt once per week to lead some guests for a day trip to the nearby lake, he can stay in the 10-bed dorm free of charge (unless it's fully booked, in which case he sleeps on the couch in the common room). Despite not having much of a plan, he is living the good life, even if it means having to clean the vomit out of the shared kitchen sink every once in a while.

The Couple

They actually were not a couple when they started their vacation ("We were best friends back home!") but you're about 60% sure this guy is going to propose in the city center, smack dab in the market square, halfway between the Hard Rock Cafe and the man playing Dancing Queen on a public piano. Oh man, it's going to be so cringe. And now your mind is racing about what if they broke up with each other on the bar crawl in front of the vendor hawking those gelatinous rubber pigs that go splat on the pavement. Just as cringy.

The Leader

Everyone in your dorm is going to go out tonight, you just don't realize it yet. That's because of The Leader, the guy who makes it his personal responsibility in life to organize something at all times. He told us about 40 minutes ago that we would be leaving for a bar he knows of in 15 minutes. So maybe his social skills are a tiny bit better than his organizing skills. But if it weren't for him, you'd be watching Tiktok videos on your phone in your bed at 10pm. Thanks to this guy, you can tell your friends back home that you actually went out.

The Guy Who Isn't Even Staying in the Hostel

This one theoretically shouldn't even be possible. The employee that checked you into the hostel told you very clearly that only people staying at the hostel are allowed inside, and you need both a key card and a 12-digit password (why so long?) to get through both sets of locked doors, yet here is this guy drinking a Lander Bräu in the common room loudly exclaiming that he wasn't actually able to find a vacant bed in the hostel, but he found his way in regardless. He's staying in an AirBnB that has "its own bathroom, can you believe it?" and anyone that actually is in the hostel was a total idiot for not paying the extra €40 a night for the privilege of having your own mini-fridge. Despite not actually staying at the hostel, he will not fail to inject himself into every conversation anyone else is having.