So! You’re planning your next adventure, and you’re looking for the best tools to help you prepare but don’t know where to start. Fortunately, the internet has made it easier than ever to plan a trip from start to finish. In this post, I’ll be sharing some of my favorite trip planning and location research tools that I’ve used over the years to plan my travels.
Inspiration & Research
This is a great place to browse destinations and find Bucket-List-worthy things to do. I like to use it to help me find more activities for places I know I’m going to so I can get the most out of my time there, but it can also be fun just to browse around and get inspired.
An incredibly detail orientated site that is backed up with heaps of references and links to other sites or resources. Search anywhere in the world (pretty much) and it’ll have a bunch of great factual information on the location, how to get there, get around, what to see, do, learn, buy, eat, drink and where to sleep. It’s very comprehensive, it’s just not pretty to look at.
The best site I’ve found for giving up-to-date information on the cost of living in various places. You can lookup different countries, regions or cities to get different levels of information. Just set your travel style to budget, mid-range or luxury and they will provide you with an average daily, weekly, fortnightly and monthly costs for 1 or 2 people. They also provide details on a host of sub-categories including: Accommodation, Transportation, Intercity Transportation, Food, Entertainment, Tips and Handouts, Scams, Robberies, and Mishaps, Alcohol, Water, and Travel Guides
A super cool and handy little app that creates and organizes your travel itinerary for you! If you’re like me, you like to book all you flights and accommodations yourself and aren’t super big on package tours/deals. It can get a bit hectic managing all that in your inbox, so simply forward any flight or booking confirmations to the app’s email address and it will organize them and create a custom itinerary of your trip for you!
Transit and travel
This one’s a no brainer but it’s definitely a good place to start. Google Maps is an essential tool for any traveler. Not only can you use it to get directions, but you can also use it to explore your destination before you even get there. You can use the street view feature to get a sense of what the area looks like, and you can save locations and create custom maps to help you plan your itinerary. Plus, with Google’s extensive database of reviews and ratings, you can find the best restaurants, bars, and attractions in the area. I mostly use it for finding out whether I can make it to x, y & z attractions within a certain time period. To actually figure out schedules for getting there, you’re much better off using…
Rome2rio is a fantastic tool for planning your transportation. It provides you with all the available transportation options between two locations, including flights, trains, buses, and even ferries. You can also see estimated travel times and costs, making it easier to plan your itinerary. This is great tool for intercity travel and does do some good international scheduling too, but if you’re flying either nationally or internationally then I recommend checking out:
When it comes to finding cheap flights, ITA Matrix is my go-to tool. Not only can you search for flights by date, but you can also search by month or even by whole year, making it easy to find the cheapest time to fly. I actually like that I can’t book my flights through the platform. I’m often booking points flights anyway, so wouldn’t do it through an aggregator anyway, but I find that ITA matrix consistently provides me with the best and broadest information on current flight routing.
Some people prefer Skyscanner, and to be honest, there’s not a huge amount of difference. However, I’ve often found actually clicking through to the bookings with Skyscanner often results in different prices than advertised. One major plus for Skyscanner though is that you can also set up price alerts, so you’ll be notified when the price of a flight drops. If you’re like me though and book a lot of points flights, then it’s well worth upskilling in your award booking abilities by checking out…
This is a fantastic website for people who aren’t sure where they want to go next but know where you’re leaving from. A highly specialized site, it simply provides you with all the possible available destinations from any one airport anywhere in the world! What’s great about this is that it helps you figure out common routing, which can be super helpful for finding flights and ultimately will save you time and money.
This is a great app for helping you find cheap deals on flights, hotels and hostels, as well as home and car rentals. A relative newcomer to the flight aggregator market, the great thing about Hopper is that it will actually show final prices for all airlines/flights in the app so you don’t have to click through like on Skyscanner. They have a price freeze option too, which is pretty cool and can be helpful if you’re plans are still in flux.
This discounted flight service is great for travellers with a bit of flexibility. Simply create use your bucket list to tell the app where you want to go and the app will send you notifications when there’s deals on flights to you destination. Tickets are usually 2-6 months out from departure, so it’s probably not for every as you need to be in life situation where that works for you (got a chill boss? No Worries!)
Run by Daniel Sciberras, who has over 2 decades of experience wringing the most out of frequent flyer reward programs, this website has pretty much everything you could possibly ask for when trying to learn how to become a pro-points hacker. Whilst it is mostly geared towards Australia and the Qantas loyalty program, there is plenty in here to help anyone become better at booking flights and saving money. For US and UK orientated content though, check out The Points Guy.
Accommodation
For budget travelers, Hostelworld is an excellent tool for finding affordable accommodation. You can search for hostels, guesthouses, and hotels, and filter your search by price, location, and amenities. I also use Booking.com a lot and if you’re traveling a lot and booking lots of places, make sure you sign up as their Genius rewards program actually does save me a substantial amount of money. The simplest way to differentiate the two is that Hostelworld is goof for the more budget traveler looking for hostels, motels, and cheaper accommodations, whilst booking.com is better for everything else.
A great website for finding both camping and glamping spots all over the world. If you love the great outdoors more than the city life then this should be a go to site for you.
These days I’m actually finding that Stayz (called Vrbo in some places) is delivering on finding me better places at cheaper prices than Airbnb. However, Airbnb has a bigger range of places, a bit more search functionality and some really unique experiences you can’t find elsewhere.
Activities and Experiences
Want to find something unique to do in the next city you visit? Atlas Obscura specializes in finding those activities that are NOT jammed with tourists or even well known by locals. There’s some really cool stuff on here and it’s definitely worth checking it out before you land anywhere new to see if something piques your interest.
This is a great little app that crowd sources information and tips on the most ‘local’ things to do. If you want to really get out of the tourist traps and check out something that locals themselves would be doing, this is a great place to find out about them. They currently operate in 82 cities worldwide, so the focus tends to be a bit more urban, but you can definitely find some real hidden gems on here. The only downside is that what gets submitted is determined by the ‘spotters’ or locals in the city, so it can be a bit all over the place and random in it’s activities.
Veganism is on the rise! Whilst I myself am not a vegan, I do strive to eat meat less often as it is definitely an important factor in our journey towards a sustainable future. This great little app will help you find where vegan restaurants are all over the world!
Viator is a great resource for finding and booking tours and activities. Whether you want to go on a city tour, take a cooking class, or go on a hiking excursion, you can find it on Viator. Plus, with their Best Price Guarantee, you can be confident that you’re getting the best deal.
Tourradar is another tour aggregator like Viator. They focus primarily on leading tour operators like Intrepid. If guided tours are your thing then this is a good way to go. Just be careful in general with aggregators because often it can actually be cheaper to use them just to find the thing you want but then go direct to the company’s website to book it.
TripAdvisor is definitely the go to resource for finding reviews and recommendations for hotels, restaurants, and attractions. But what sets it apart from other review sites is its extensive forum community, where travelers can ask and answer questions about their destinations. Plus, with their booking feature, you can book hotels and activities directly from the site.
IF you’re a person that likes travel guides, then Lonely Planet is my top pick. Their guidebooks cover almost every destination in the world, and they provide practical information on everything from visas to local customs. Plus, their website is packed with travel tips and recommendations from seasoned travelers.
Special Mention : Uncovering Hidden Gems
This one doesn’t quite make the actual list because currently they are just starting up and currently only provide information on Australia and Bali. However, if you like getting off the beaten track, finding unique experiences no one else really knows, or just getting away from the usual tourist traps, this website will sell you their bespoke maps that integrate with google maps to show you where all the best things to do are!
In conclusion, these are just a few of the many trip planning and location research tools available to travelers. Whether you’re looking for cheap flights, affordable accommodation, or fun things to do, these tools can help make your trip planning process a lot easier. So, what are you waiting for? Start planning your next adventure today!
