Guess it depends where you want to travel. I tend to use hotels in Europe now when I travel. My experiences are just as good, if not better, in hotels most of the time.

But Europe's a big place, so I can accept that it's not the case everywhere.

If you care about the price, youth hostels are way cheaper (and includes you in the local life faster), if you don't hostels are just better. For medium-term, Airbnb is still great though.