The 10 Best Travel Apps to Download Before Your Next Trip
There are a collection of travel apps that we really relied on during our year abroad. As much as I can romanticize travel pre-smart phone, travel apps are amazing and make a truly positive impact on our enjoyment and ease of travel.
Here are, in our opinion, the best travel apps that I simply never want to travel without!
TRAVEL PLANNING
GOOGLE MAPS LISTS - A navigation app is obviously a necessity for travel. But for this post I’m specifically talking about Google Maps Lists. Before arriving at our destination, I will plug all of the places that we want to see, eat, do, etc. into Google Maps and pin them under my “Want to Go” list. Those little “Want to Go” green flag fill the map of our destination and help me understand what sights are near each other and how we will tackle everything that we want to see. The “Want to Go” flags are also great when your group is suddenly hungry and you don’t know where to eat. You can easily spot if there’s a place nearby that you wanted to try. We also loved that Google Maps are downloadable. You can choose an area to download so that your map is available offline.
LONELY PLANET - This app use to be my first stop to research the main tourist attractions in a destination. But about halfway through our travels, they started to make you pay for content and, well, I knew that I could go to their website to get the information for free. If you’re only going to one or two destinations during a vacation this app is perfect because, I believe, the content is still free or at least worth the price. We really vibe with Lonely Planet’s reviews more than other mainstream travel resources. Also, I loved reading from their museum guides during a visit to serve as my family’s very own tour guide.
CULTURE TRIP - It feels like Culture Trip came out of nowhere. Yet they’ve been around since 2011. Their articles are everywhere and on, seemingly, every destination! I never used them before our year of travel. I love a listicle and they provide a lot of them. It’s a great place to start your search of what to see in a city and also for detailed guides on tourist attractions.
ROME TO RIO - What modes of transportation are available from point A to point B? When I was booking travel from Dubrovnik to Athens, I pictured us taking a long ferry or train ride. Nope! In my mind, the locations seemed much closer. Our options were a 21 hour bus ride (not happening) or a flight. After that experience, my first stop in booking travel was always the Rome to Rio app. The app lays out all of your transportation options between two points. While I don’t use it as a booking platform (I find that sometimes the pricing is off), it does help me understand the scope of what modes of transportation are available. Something travel engines like Expedia or Google Flights do not provide.
TRAVEL TOOLS
XE CURRENCY - Sometimes currency translation is hard. A U.S. dollar to the euro? That exchange is easy to estimate in your head. Right now, it sits at 1 U.S. dollar to .84 euros. What about when you’re in Hungary? 1 U.S. dollar equals 303 Hungarian forints. Which is why one day I withdrew cash at a Hungarian ATM that equaled $600 U.S. when I only wanted $60. From that point on, I doubled checked my withdrawal amount with the XE app before proceeding with the transaction!
WHATSAPP - WhatsApp never really caught on much in the States (from my experience) but it’s the default mode of communication in much of the world. From Airbnb hosts in Croatia to tuktuk drivers in Cambodia, we communicated with most everyone through WhatsApp. It’s also great for texting (via wifi) with anyone back home who doesn’t have an iPhone (if you yourself are an iPhone user).
GOOGLE TRANSLATE - This app saved us in many a confusing language barrier situation. But we actually used the app’s camera feature more often. You can scan text in another language and the app will translate it in real time. (This feature isn’t offered for all languages, like Slovenian for example.) This little app and I spent many hours grocery shopping together. Let’s just say that I accidentally bought non-dairy butter (or other random, mistake purchases) too many times before I started translating almost every item!
LOCAL FOOD DELIVERY / RIDESHARE APP - Hard to imagine but Uber doesn’t exist everywhere. Yet. Different areas of the world/countries/cities have their own food delivery/rideshare apps. Grab is the most popular app for these services in Southeast Asia. I had only taken one Uber before traveling long term and had never done food delivery through an app like Uber. (I know, now it’s unimaginable!) But I made up for lost time with the Grab app. Life on the road means that there are a lot of slow days. And while a goal of ours was to cook more, it was cheaper, and more delicious, to eat at restaurants in Southeast Asia. So we did what we must and ordered so many bahn mi sandwiches in Hoi An and never looked back.
AIRLINE APPS - Download your airline’s app pre-flight for easier check in and boarding pass access. Also, inflight entertainment is sometimes only available through the airline’s app, so it’s best to have it already downloaded.
LIBBY - It may not be a “travel” app, per se, but the Libby app made such a wonderful impact on our day to day life while traveling. Through Libby you can borrow books and audiobooks from your local public library. Trent and I read more in our year of travel than ever before. And it was great for our kids as well since they can blow through a Magic Tree House book in 2 days. No need to carry heavy books in your already bursting luggage. Oh and also, it’s free!
KHAN ACADEMY - I took a course on World War I from Khan Academy while in Europe and couldn’t believe how much I referenced what I had learned while visiting museums and landmarks. I love that Khan Academy has quizzes throughout the learning to make sure you are actually digesting the information along the way. Also, their lessons are downloadable. An important element for learning on the road!
LOCATION SPECIFIC APPS - There are some great location specific apps out there that can really increase the enjoyment and ease of travel. We loved the TDR App designed for Tokyo Disney. It’s not an official Disney app but you wouldn’t know it by how amazingly it works. Keep an eye out while you research destinations for other location specific apps that travelers love. There are so many helpful city metro map apps out there too!
What apps do you love? I never found a travel itinerary app that I loved. People love Google Trips and TripIt but they weren’t for me. Do you have a travel itinerary tracker that you use religiously? Share it all in the comments below.
