(List updated on October 2021)
When the first smartphone was introduced to the public in the late ‘00s, nobody could predict the impact it would have on our daily lives. Nowadays, we are able to book, organise and enjoy our holidays on the go, with the help of dedicated travel apps. But with so many choices out there, how do you know which ones to pick?
We have tried and tested all the available travel applications out there to find out the best of the best. So, without further ado, here are the best travel apps on the market, as picked by the Stasher team.
Best Travel Apps for Gamers
Questo
RPG fans will love Questo. Part tour guide, part role-play, and part scavenger hunt, Questo engages users in fun challenges while they discover the history and culture of the places they visit. Players can take on the role of a famous historical figure and play out their life stories while visiting their hometown. You can visit Milan as Leonardo da Vinci, tour London as Jack the Ripper, or explore 1960s San Francisco with the Grateful Dead.
Questo offers a range of free and paid game modules sorted by destination and theme.
Games are available 24/7 and suitable for all ages. Players who want to take a break can pause Questo and pick up right where they left off at any time.
Price: Free app; Game modules run from free to €19.99.
Map Your City
Map Your City gives travelers a new kind of map where explorers and storytellers meet.
App users join different Map Your City communities where they gather with like-minded people to find attractions, restaurants, stores, and other points of interest. Storytellers can tell their tales in existing groups or create their own custom group to share and promote their favorite activities and places.
Price: Free for explorers. Storytellers can join one of the existing communities for free or create their own for $25/month.
Best Travel Apps for Camping
iOverlander
Kelli Lovett, long-term traveler and founder of the Vanabond Tales, recommends the iOverlander app. iOverlander is a nonprofit organization dedicated to making life on the road easier. The handy iOverlander app includes a series of maps with GPS locations that tell travelers where they can camp and find mechanics, gas, restrooms, and restaurants.
The app also publishes warnings and advises travelers of upcoming official checkpoints. Recent updates have added professional photos and several features that work while offline.
Price: Free, but the company encourages donations.
HipCamp
This travel app, submitted to us by blogger Steve Warren of Maps Over Coffee, is basically an Airbnb for camping. Property owners lease part of their land to campers wishing to park an RV, pitch a tent, or stay in rustic cottages. HipCamp users also get access to exclusive glamping facilities and can earn cash rewards for referring friends.
HipCamp primarily operates within the US, but the company has recently expanded into Canada and Australia. HipCamp also partners with camping gear manufacturer REI to further enhance the experience for app users. The app has been featured in prominent magazines, such as Outside, Smithsonian, and Conde Nast Traveler.
Price: Free
AllStays App
Kate Paulwell from Caravan Sleeps recommends the AllStays series of apps for all your camping needs. The apps include over 37,000 campgrounds as well as hotel chains, independent truck stops, military facilities, and RV parks. AllStays also helps users locate rest areas, welcome centers, wifi, and RV dumping facilities. The company’s Pro memberships include many more maps and membership perks. Currently, AllStays mobile apps are only available for Apple devices. However, Android users can still access free guides on the company’s website.
Price: From $.99 to $9.99
All Trails
Blogger Nina Ragusa from Where in the World is Nina recommends All Trails, an app that includes more than 200,000 hiking, biking, and scenic driving trails. The app categorizes all paths according to difficulty level and features suitable hikes for dogs and children, as well as stroller-friendly and wheelchair-accessible routes.
All Trails maintains a 4.9-star rating with App Store’s Editor’s Choice, and 1% of all Pro subscription revenue goes to environmental groups that protect wilderness areas.
Price: The basic version is free. The Pro version costs $29.99/year and includes extra features.
WikiCamps
According to Liz Marie Millan, founder of The House Number Five, WikiCamps is the ultimate camping companion for exploring the Australian outback. The app offers a comprehensive database of campgrounds, hostels, RV parks, facilities, and points of interest.
Designed with the true adventure traveler in mind, WikiCamps includes offline maps and content for when you’re traveling out of signal range. The WikiCamps app has been recognized by Google, Expedition Australia, and Gumtree and has expanded to include Canada, New Zealand, the US, and the UK.
Price: AU$7.99
Best Travel Apps for Families
Mamava
Mamava is an app designed to make traveling easier for breastfeeding mothers. Unfortunately, breastfeeding in public is still frowned upon in much of the English-speaking world. Mamava provides directions to secure lactation spaces where women can breastfeed and pump in peace.
The company also maintains 1,800 of its own specially designed pods in hospitals, schools, offices, and transportation hubs across North America. Mamava pods feature stroller spaces, comfortable benches, and outlets to plug in pumps and other electronic devices. Additionally, the app publishes state-by-state laws for moms traveling through the United States.
Price: Free
Launchtrip
Traveling with family and friends can be a lot of fun, but it’s not without its challenges. Launchtrip aims to take the stress out of making group travel plans, including booking hotels, reserving restaurants, and splitting payments. The app allows users to create a custom profile, select their destinations, and peruse recommendations suited to their group’s interests. Launchtrip also offers group discounts at participating restaurants and hotels.
The Launchtrip app currently covers eight major US cities but plans to add another 15 locations by late 2021. The company is set to expand globally in 2022.
Price:
- Download Launchtrip for iOS
- Launchtrip for Android will be available on November 15, 2021.
Best Travel Apps for Virtual Tours
GlobeTrott Travel
GlobeTrott is an app that lets you visit a location before you even get there. The app creates personalized digital tours, including both popular tourist attractions and hidden gems. GlobeTrott also features audio insights from local experts for each stop on your tour.
Cofounded by the European Union Investment Fund, GlobeTrott covers locations in the US, UK, and throughout Europe.
Price: free
Junket
Junket is a self-guided tour app featuring puzzles, historical detours, multi-path adventures, and virtual scavenger hunts. Players can form teams or go solo to earn Junket points and trophies. Themed tours include literary journeys, gourmet tastings, beer-making experiences, ghost-spotting adventures, and cinematic expeditions. Besides offering practical information and fun games, the app includes GPS-triggered audio and video content to provide real-time narration for your trip.
Price: Free for basic app. In-app products range from $.99 to $99.00 each.
Best Travel Apps for Flying
At Your Gate
Stewart McGrenary, director of Freedom Mobiles, recommends At Your Gate for frequent air travelers. The At Your Gate app helps passengers find food and delivery services at airports, avoiding the stress of potentially missing a connection. Travelers can order meals from participating vendors and have their food delivered while they await their flight. Customers can also take advantage of in-app promo codes for discounts.
At Your Gate is currently available at 17 airports, and the company plans to add another 10 locations by the end of 2021.
Price: Free
Timeshifter
Timeshifter’s founders created their handy app to help travelers avoid jet lag. Designed by a team of renowned scientists, Timeshifter has been trusted by professionals as diverse as astronauts, athletes, and top CEOs. The app uses timed light exposure to reset the brain’s circadian clock, allowing travelers to quickly adapt to new time zones.
The company is currently preparing to launch a similar Shift Work app to help workers optimize sleep cycles and enhance their quality of life.
Price: The first jet lag plan is free. Additional plans are $9.99 each or $25 for a full year of access.
Big thank you to Cara from Penny Polly who gave us the heads up about this app!
Best Travel Apps for Safety
GOEX Travel Safety App
GOEX Worldwide has added a Travel Safety App to its line of AI-oriented software. The Travel Safety App maintains a 5.0 rating at the AppStore, where it remains the site’s highest-rated app for secure travel.
Developed by a former Head of Hostile Environments for a UN Security Council member, the app includes an international alert system, pandemic risk assessments, and custom risk ratings for your itinerary.
Price: £.89
- Download GOEX Travel Safety App for iOS
- Currently unavailable for Android
Best Travel Apps for Saving Money
The Points Guy
The Points Guy is a personal points and miles consultant. App users can track all their airline, hotel, and credit card loyalty points and miles in one place. The Points Guy aims to help travelers earn points and miles more effectively and never let their rewards expire. The Points Guy app also provides a curated newsfeed for a deeper understanding of loyalty rewards programs and how to make the most of them.
Price: Free
- Download The Points Guy for iOS
- Currently unavailable for Android
Wander
Wander is a search engine where you can coordinate all the details of your trip, including flights, accommodations, car rentals, and tours. The site acts like a traditional travel agency but allows travelers to have more control over their trip details. You can input your parameters, and Wander will suggest a travel package that works with your budget.
Although there’s no mobile app yet, travelers can download a Wander browser extension at the Chrome Web Store.
Airsorted
Whether you are out of town on a business trip or a summer holiday, don’t let your empty property just sit there: put it to work and fund your travels with Airsorted! They will handle everything for you, from responding to enquiries and checking the guests in, to cleaning the flat after they check out. They get a fee for their services, while you practically earn money doing nothing. If only they could do your day job for you too…
Price: Free
Bunq
If you are still relying on banks and currency exchange bureaus in the 21st century, you are doing it wrong. Unless you want to waste hundreds of pounds on hidden fees and unfavourable exchange rates, start using Bunq.
The Dutch startup was launched in 2015 by Ali Niknam with a simple mission: making money management easier around the world. Bunq currently charges no fees for most of its services and uses mid-market rates to offer the best possible bang for your buck when exchanging currencies. Not to mention that you get a colorful new card to use anywhere in the world!
Price: Free
WiFi Map
Using your mobile data abroad is extremely expensive. Although roaming charges within the EU have been scrapped since June 2017, this is not the case for the rest of the world. WiFi Map is a crowdsourced database that allows you to find accessible Wi-Fi hotspots around you.
Users can share the passwords of WiFi networks with the community and contribute to a growing pool of freely accessible hotspots. You can also “download” a map of WiFi codes for the city you’ll be visiting, allowing you to remain in touch with the online world without spending a single megabyte of your data plan.
Price: Free (£4 for Pro version)
Hopper
Aeroplane ticket prices fluctuate all the time. Although there are many theories regarding how you can manipulate the algorithm into getting cheaper tickets (like browsing in incognito mode or using a VPN), nothing is proven to work. Hopper is one of the most useful travel apps here, as it takes the guesswork out of the booking process and predicts ticket prices for up to a year with 95% accuracy so you can always be certain you got the best deal.
The app has a nice extra feature called Fair Bear, that clearly explains all the restrictions of the airfare you are about to buy (cancellation fees, baggage fees, etc.) The app is free to use, so give it a spin before your next trip. You could end up saving more than you thought!
Price: Free
Stasher
We may not have a mobile app (yet!), but our app Stasher can easily be used from your mobile device! Save time and money on impractical left luggage storage lockers and store your bags in one of our StashPoints all over the world! Whether you are waiting for that late flight or waiting until you check in your hotel, Stasher has got you covered with convenient, affordable and full-insured luggage storage solutions. So, we think we are absolutely justified to include our service in the best travel apps list!
Price: Free
Best Travel Apps for Outdoor Adventures
The nonprofit Adventure Cycling Association launched the Bicycle Route Navigator app after mapping over 50,000 miles of bike routes across North America. App data includes distances, route maps, detailed descriptions, elevation profiles, and weather information. The Bicycle Route Navigator also provides listings for campsites, bike shops, restaurants, and cyclists-only lodging.
Price: Free
Get My Boat
Get My Boat is an Airbnb-style service for boat rentals and yacht charters, connecting travelers directly with captains, boat owners, and boat companies. Get My Boat provides over 140,000 boats to choose from and offers water experiences in 9,300 destinations worldwide.
Price: Free
Best Travel Apps for Road Trips
Mirror Trip
Mirror Trip makes it easy for travelers to make one-way car rentals by connecting customers with people going in the opposite direction. The app provides the perfect solution for people moving across the country, traveling to purchase a vehicle, or planning to take a different mode of transportation for their return trip.
Mirror Trip’s ride-switching app has been featured in Forbes magazine and maintains a 5-star rating among Google reviewers.
Price: Free
r3Charge
r3Charge is an up-and-coming app dedicated to helping over 20 million electric car owners find places to recharge. The app will also allow travelers in 42 countries to directly book more than 10,000 hotels equipped with electric vehicle charging points.
Although the r3Charge app is still in development, EV owners can currently use the company’s web interface to make their road trips easier.
Best Travel App for Social Equity
Blistey
Blistey is an online business directory and lifestyle brand dedicated to promoting diversity. The Blistey app connects travelers with Black, Asian, Latinx, indigenous, and women-owned businesses around the world.
Price: Free
Best Travel Apps For Booking Tickets
Skyscanner
Although Skyscanner is not used exclusively to book flights (the service extends to hotels and rental cars as well), it is one of the most popular choices. The biggest selling point of the app is the freedom it gives to the user: you don’t even have to pick a destination or a specific travel date.
Skyscanner will provide you with the
Price: Free
Google Flights
The Holy Mother of Search Engines (aka the big G, aka Google) has an impressive suite of useful apps across all platforms. Travel is not an exception: it seems like the Californian company seems to have its eyes set on providing you with the answer to the meaning of life, the universe, and everything.
Although Google Flights is not an app per se, it works perfectly well on your mobile browser. You can get price graphs to explore price trends, tips about when to book to get the best deal and how fares change when you fly to different airports. Although it is not as polished as fully optimised apps, it can help you discover deals you might have otherwise missed.
Price: Free
Best Travel Apps For Organizing Your Trip
Packpoint
Going somewhere new for a few days and have absolutely no idea what to pack? There is an app for that! Packpoint gives you recommendations on what to pack, based on the weather at your destination, as well as the length and type of your trip. The lists are customisable and can be easily shared among your friends, so nobody forgets anything important. Next time you’re unsure about what to pack, give Packpoint a try!
Price: Free ($2.99 for Premium)
GetYourGuide
GetYourGuide connects travellers with activities and things to do, anywhere in the world. Through the app, you can easily book available tours, excursions and experiences near you and create unique memories on your holiday.
To this day, the app offers more than 33,000 different services around the globe: from sightseeing tours to quirky activities, if it exists, you can book it here. Certainly helpful if you want to squeeze every little bit of your adventure!
Price: Free
Rome2Rio
Curious to learn how much a trip from your couch to Ulaanbaatar would cost? Do you want to visit your auntie Grizelda on the other side of the country but don’t know how to get there? Rome2Rio is a multimodal transport search engine that will get you there in all the possible combinations.
Just put any address as the origin and Rome2Rio will search among thousands of possible flight, ferry, bus, train and driving routes to get you to your destination. Then, it’s up to you to choose the one that suits you the best. Really useful if you want to explore alternative routes or if you feel like getting to Moscow by car is a good idea (it is not).
Price: Free
TripIt
Keeping track of your itinerary details can quickly get messy, especially on long trips with many destinations. So instead of frantically searching through your emails when you are trying to find booking confirmations, just use TripIt. This app will automatically create a detailed and easily accessible itinerary of your trip. You only have to forward them your travel confirmation e-mails and you’re all set!
Price: Free (Pro subscription costs £39 p/a)
Best Travel Apps For Accommodation
Airbnb
The app that defined the sharing economy could not be left out of this list. Airbnb allows users to list their available accommodations (apartment, house, or room), with travellers who want to rent them. This is especially useful if you need to stay in a place for more than a few days, as the daily rates are usually lower than a hotel.
Apart from homes, the website also lets people list “experiences” in many places all over the world, promoting their services (tours, day trips and classes). Great if you are travelling with larger groups and if you want to stay in a more “homey” environment.
Price: Free
Hotels.com
Hotels.com is part of the Expedia Group. They work with an extensive network of hotels, ranging from major chains to local B&Bs. The main reason we love this app is that it offers an exceptional reward system for its users.
After booking 10 nights, you get a free stay at a hotel (the total worth is determined by your average rate for those nights). Furthermore, you can unlock Secret Deals for luxurious accommodation at impressively lower rates. Definitely worth a shot, especially for seasoned hotel dwellers.
Price: Free
Pruvo
The world of online accommodation booking is filled with secrets and hacks that can potentially save travellers a lot of money. Pruvo is an app that disrupts the booking process by letting you rebook the same hotel room for a lower price at a future date.
Evidence suggest that many hotel room prices experience price drops after a reservation was made. However, tracking them manually would be an unrealistic concept (unless you spend all of your time in front of the PC). Pruvo tracks your booking and alerts you about price changes in real time, so you can rebook your room at a lower price.
Although this only works on bookings with free cancellation, it’s a nifty little free app that can potentially save you a lot of money. After all, it couldn’t hurt to give it a
- Download Pruvo app for iOS
- Download Pruvo app for Android
- Download the Pruvo app Google Chrome extension
Best Travel Apps For Last-Minute Inspiration
Hotel Tonight
Sometimes, plans fall through, destinations change and the panic kicks in. Do not despair though, as Hotel Tonight is here to solve all your last-minute accommodation problems. The idea is simple and lucrative for everyone: hotels upload their unsold rooms for the day through the platform at a discounted price, while you get to drown your sorrows in hotel breakfast juice.
Price: Free
Dayuse
Waiting times between trips are inevitable. While they can be a drag, layover times can also be a great opportunity to explore a city. However, sometimes you just don’t want to use your available time to wander.
Dayuse lets you book hotel rooms and amenities for a few hours (six to 10 mostly) at greatly reduced rates. This will give you enough time to relax, take a shower and possibly catch some zzz’s before going on with your journey. Although the property inventory is not really that wide yet, this is a great solution for the weary business
Price: Free
LoungeBuddy
The real problem with layover times starts when your waiting hours are too many to spend in an airport and too few to actually see or do anything interesting. LoungeBuddy solves that problem by allowing access to premium lounges to all travellers, regardless of membership and fare types. You just book through the app and enjoy some peace and quiet away from the busy terminal. Time flies when you’re comfortable!
Price: The app is free to download. The Priority Pass function offers access to airport lounges in more than 400 cities and comes in three tiers: Standard (£80 upfront, £21 per person), Standard Plus (£200 upfront, £21 per person – including 10 free visits) and Prestige (£320 upfront with unlimited access to any Priority Pass lounge).
Best Travel Apps For Transport
Turo
Turo (formerly RelayRides) is a peer-to-peer car sharing company, that connects private car owners with people who want to rent them. Contrary to traditional car rental services, this particular company does not own or maintain any cars, which reduces rental costs.
Turo offers more than 800 different models of vehicles, thus making your travels as distinctive an experience as each one of the provided cars. As of now, the company serves in more than 5.000 cities, in the US (except for NY), some Canadian provinces, the UK and Germany.
Price: Free
Citymapper
Citymapper is a public transit app and mapping service. Unlike Google Maps, which also provides data for transport modes, like walking, cycling and driving, the developers of this app decided to give emphasis on public transportation.
They have even created Smartride; their own form of transportation, which is a hybrid between a bus and a cab. Although the company started out in London, they now cover many cities around the globe. So next time you are looking for a bus or a cab and are worried about transfer times and congestion, use Citymapper!
Price: Free
FLIO
5800+ airports all over the world. From flight tracking and departure board information to discounts on airport shops and lounge area access,
Price: Free
Uber
It is likely that you have already heard or used Uber, the ridesharing app that changed the way we move around cities. With a network that extends to over 700 cities all over the world, Uber provides a reliable -and usually more affordable- alternative to regular taxi cabs. Ease of use and safety are what makes Uber preferable by many travellers since all drivers must meet certain criteria and pass a background check before being able to sign up.
Price: Free
Waze
Waze is a community-based navigation app that directs drivers using real-time crowdsourced information. The community can report traffic-related incidents (traffic jams, police presence, road construction) to the app, which is then shared with the rest of the users.
The app can also help you find nearby gas stations or reroute you to avoid congestion entirely. Although there are many GPS apps out there, Waze stands out as a car navigation tool because of its ease of use and community-based information.
Price: Free
Best Travel Apps For Socialization
Google Translate
Although Google Translate has many applications, learning a few phrases of the country you are visiting can help you make friends! The app also has real-time functionality for direct conversations. Although it is far from Star Trek’s “Universal Translator”, it is an impressive technological feat. A must download for every mobile device user!
Price: Free
Bumble
Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the last five years, you probably know about Tinder. What you don’t know is that the founding team quickly moved on to their next project, which is also a dating app: Bumble.
The premise is very similar, but on Bumble, only women are allowed to initiate conversation. This app has a reputation for having a more mature audience than Tinder, as the average age and education level are higher. Either way, it is a great opportunity to meet exciting new people abroad. Who knows? Maybe the next right swipe is your destiny!
Price: Free (offers in-app purchases)
Duolingo
Learning the language is one of the best ways to immerse yourself in the culture of a foreign country and bond with the locals. The problem is, learning a language takes a lot of time. Duolingo takes all the boring parts out of the process and turns into a game!
Users can track their progress in grammar, vocabulary, and speaking while the app frequently challenges you to take tests to practice what you’ve learned. With Duolingo, not only will you be able to learn some basic phrases in a foreign language, but if you are a good student, really learn it!
Price: Free
Best Travel Apps For Entertainment
Netflix
Responsible for countless lost hours of productivity, Netflix is one of the easiest ways to enjoy original streamable content from your laptop or mobile device. The reason the Netflix app is a valuable travel companion is the fact that you can download your
Price: Free
Kindle
As much as we can all appreciate a good movie or TV show, there is no substitute for a good book. However, there is a limit to how many books you can carry on your trips, especially if you are travelling low cost. Kindle by Amazon is the app every bibliophile in the world should have, as it offers you millions of e-books to choose from. What’s even better is that you can pack as many of them as you like without worrying about size regulations.
Price: Free
Hi! I am George and I am the Content Lead for Stasher.com. I love travel, writing, making music and meeting new and interesting people.