Having all the best apps for travel on your phone is going to make your life and overall travel experience so much easier

Here are the best travel apps I know and trust.

(p.s there’s 37 and they’re all worth having!)

Best Apps For Booking Flights

Skyscanner 

124k reviews, 4.7star rating, Editors choice badge in the Apple App store

Probably the ultimate and best known search engine for flights. And why I’ve selected it as my number one best app for travel, specifically for booking flights.

It’s super easy to use. Whether you use desktop or the app, but I recommend the app for when you’re on the move. There are great options for ‘’explore everywhere” if you haven’t decided where you want to go. It’ll use your current location and then give you a list of countries you can fly to, in cost order, cheapest to the most expensive destination.

They also have tabs for recommended destinations, “your perfect trip” and best deals by month. Select preferences such as currency, country and language. Also save your card details in the app for ease of booking without having to remember all those numbers

Momondo

 2k reviews, 4.8 star rating

Another great search engine for flights. They have a nice “explore” map function which you can change into a list view to see all the latest deals

I Know The Pilot (Australian) 

7.9k reviews, 4.8 star rating

This is a deals website and App giving you the latest on flights and hotels. They have a great email subscription option. Have the latest deals sent straight to your inbox, so you never miss out.

Expedia 

52k reviews, 4.7 star rating

Expedia has booking information for flights, hotels, cars and activities. They have a great deals and last minute section as well as VIP access to hotels.

Local Airlines

eg Qantas, Singapore Airlines, United etc

Pretty self explanatory. They’re the airline’s own apps. I download the best apps applicable to the country I’m in and then just delete them again once I leave. If you book through them directly some of them have great functions like in app alerts, online check-in, flight information and onboard WiFi information.

Best Apps For Booking Accommodation

Booking.com

227k reviews, 4.8 star rating

Booking.com is the absolute behemoth in the accommodation booking space and for good reason. Most hotels, hostels, B’n’B’s (you name it) across the world are advertising on this app. You can set preferences such a WiFi, breakfast included, car parking, or must have a swimming pool, to really whittle down the search results to exactly the type of accommodation you are looking for.

Have a look at what booking.com has to offer here

Airbnb

61k reviews, 4.8 star rating

The best app for travellers who want the comfort, feeling and personal touch of being at home while overseas. There are over 6 million properties across the world listed on Airbnb. Who wouldn’t want their own kitchen, washing machine or an entire house to really stretch out in, without the sterile feeling of a hotel, or the exorbitant laundry costs?

Airbnb has a huge range of super unique accommodations worth checking out.

Hostelworld

19k reviews, 4.8 star rating

For the backpackers, budget travellers and socialites of the travel world. Hostel world gives you exactly what the name suggests. It really is the best app for, Hostels! You can select preferences, such as a dorm or private rooms, shared bathrooms or private to make sure you get exactly what you’re looking for.

Read this article on how to be the best Hostel guest ever!

Agoda

15k reviews, 4.8 star rating

Agoda is the absolute best app for travel in Asia. They are predominately an accommodation app, however have recently branched into a flight search engine too. They have a great deals page, map option and private messaging system in app

Couch Surfing

567 reviews, 4.7 star rating

For the ultra adventurous amongst us. Couch surfing is a community more so than an accommodation search engine. It’s billed as the best way to stay with amazing locals. You create a profile and search for hosts in the places you want to visit. You might be staying on a couch, an air mattress or maybe a spare room. The whole premise behind couch surfing is to stay, interact and learn from each other. Oh and there is no exchange of money! It’s free. There are over 12 million people in the couch surfing community

Best Apps For Activities & Experiences

Viator

245 reviews, 4.1 star rating

Viator is part of the Trip Advisor family. It’ll give you have instant access to over 200k bookable experiences around the world. Each activity is given a star rating, you can access the reviews, book your tickets and store your mobile tickets in the app.

Get Your Guide

94 ratings, 3.6 star rating

Similar to Viator. Tell the app where you’re going and it will give you the best-guided tours, skip-the-line tickets and must-see attractions at your chosen destination. Bookings are available and mobile tickets in-app.

Check out some of the great activities and tours available here

Trip Advisor

15k reviews, 4.5 star rating

The OG of trip planning and booking activities. With over 859 million reviews it’s the go to app to source information and reviews from other travellers about whether or not you should or should not book anything!

Airbnb – Experiences

This is not a separate app from Airbnb. Airbnb Experiences are a great way to book an experience and more often than not, with a true local. Check it out. You can book walking tours, photos tours, and bar hopping tours all with locals to the area

Freetour.com

31 reviews, 4.4 star rating

A fantastic little app whereby you can easily book top quality free tours and budget activities with local guides. The activities are ranked, rated and reviewed by previous tour guests. Booking references numbers are provided when you book your spot on the tour, so you can show the tour leader upon arrival.

Eventbrite

24k reviews, 4.8 star rating

This app is great for activities such as concerts, festivals, classes, conferences and some free events too.

You can register and get tickets to the events, store your card details in app, and share events with your friends so they don’t miss out on tickets

Best Apps For Travel & Transport

Rome2rio

352 reviews with 4.8 star rating

The best of the best apps for travel and transport in my opinion. This app has been designed to have you navigating and travelling like a pro. The developers work closely with leading train and bus companies to bring you the quickest routes from A to B, with the best prices. It’s not only buses and trains though, it gives you all modes of transportation from planes, to bikes to ride share options. A definite must have.

Rentalcars.com

6.1k reviews and 4.6 star rating

The developers of rentalcars.com app work with every major car hire company to provide its users with the nearest car, at the lowest price. There are 49, 000 locations across the world, so you book in advance or you can even book spur of the minute if you have change of plans/mind about how to get around

Local ride shares

e.g Uber, Lyft, Ola, Grab, Blabla Car (website only)

Uber 128k reviews 4.7 star rating, Lyft 12k reviews 4.9 star rating, Ola 154k reviews 4.7 star rating, Grab 2.6k reviews 4.3 star rating

We all know rideshare car options and how they work. Just download the one relevant to the country you’re in, upload your card details and you’re ready to ride.

Flixbus

55 reviews 2.9 star rating

Flixbus is a European bus line with a spider web of routes across the continent. I don’t believe the rating is a fair representation of Flixbus. I used them extensively through the Balkans and absolutely loved them. They were reliable, clean, easy to find (they’re bright green), good bus stop locations, super cheap tickets, WiFi, toilets and charging stations on board. Plus super easy to book using the app.

Omio

3.7k reviews 4.8 star rating

A transportation app for use in Europe, USA and Canada that works with an ever expanding selection of partners across flights, bus and train travel. The travel app offers live trip updates, platform info and in app ticket storage

Trainline

128 reviews 5 star rating

All the train and bus journeys in one app, available for Europe and UK bookings. You can compare 220 train and bus companies in the app including the London Overground, The Heathrow Express, Deutsche Bahn, Trenitalia and more. You can pay in your preferred currency, book in advance or within 15 minutes of departure. Tickets are also stored in the app for security and ease of use.

For even more of the best apps for travel, specifically road trips, check out this great post by Meg of FrostandSun.com with her favourite 14 road trip apps

Best Apps For Keeping In Touch

WhatsApp

484k Reviews 4.7 Star rating

The most popular messaging app the world over. If you don’t have this free messaging app you’re one of the few missing out. The app currently has 2 billion users and you can understand why. It’s free (including NO international charges) and easy to use.

The app is linked to your phone number so no need to create a profile, or have it linked to a social platform. You can create group chats, make regular phone calls and video calls (recently updated with group video calls for up to 8 participants) , send photos, media documents and your current location.

My top choice for best communication app to travel with.

Zoom

36k reviews 4.6 rating

The number of Zoom downloads and monthly users has exploded since you know who showed up (10 millions monthly users in December 2019 compared to 300 millions in March 2020)

A video conferencing app that has come to the rescue of businesses and families alike. It’s free with unlimited time limits for two callers, 40 minute time limit for over 2 callers and paid upgrades available for over 2 callers with unlimited time frame.

In the paid version you also have the ability to record the calls/meetings. After some recent hacking issues, all meeting rooms are password protected for security.

Messenger

99k reviews 4.2 star rating

The original free messaging service. Great because you didn’t need to exchange phone numbers, you could simply send messages to your Facebook buddies for free. It has now been updated that you don’t even need to have a Facebook account to use Messenger

Best General Travel Apps

XE Currency

1.5k  reviews 4.6 star rating

The best currency converter app in my opinion. You can load in your home currency and up to nine others. It works offline and rates are updated every minute. Great for quick conversions whilst you’re out and about and without a WiFi connection.

This app made it into my Ultimate International Travel Hacks list and for good reason

Google

13k reviews, 4.4 star rating

We all know and love Google. The number one search engine in the world. No further explanation needed.

Google maps

243k reviews 4.7 star rating

Another app needing no explanation. It has over 220 countries and territories mapped out for you, with real time GPS navigation, business information, street names, public transport info, restaurants and more. You’d literally be lost without it…boom tish!

Google Suite

e.g Sheets, Docs, Drive, Translate

There are a number of apps in the Google Suite which, in my opinion, are great for any bloggers, notetakers, journal makers, spreadsheet lovers, language speakers, or Cloud saving travellers out there.

What’s great particularly with a number of them, is that you can use them offline, as long as you select the offline button (you need to select the button whilst you’re still online)

That way you can update sheets and docs on the go. No more forgetting important info before you get to the WiFi at your hotel.

Netflix

15k reviews, 3.9 star rating

We all know and love Netflix. Did you know that you can download episodes and movies and save them in the app for future viewing when you’re offline? Fabulous for those long train/bus journeys with endless hours to kill.

Hotspot Shield VPN

2.8k reviews, 4.2 star rating 

Having a personal VPN is great for privacy and security whilst travelling. Activate it before you go online to protect yourself whilst doing anything that needs another layer of security eg banking, making reservations or even for watching Netflix in countries where it is not allowed. Simply select the country you want your virtual location to be and away you go. Safe and secure surfing.

Tripcoin

324 reviews, 4.8 star rating

This app is going to be your best budget keeping and spending habit buddy whilst travelling. It has a simple interface which is all you need to be able to keep track of your daily spending habits.

You can upload a home currency and then upload your spending in the local currency. It also has great graphs and reports which break down how and where you are spending your money (eg accommodation, food, transport) and equally the areas you can cut back in.

You can set a budget, enter unlimited trips and entries per trip and even snap your receipts to upload.

Are you trying to travel on a budget? This blog will definitely help you travel for longer with less

Apple Music or Spotify

Apple Music app free with iPhones unrated, Spotify 1.5m Reviews 4.7 star rating

Barely worth mentioning tbh. We all love and need music in our lives and definitely whilst travelling, sitting on buses, trains and planes. Both are great music apps. Take your pick and have access to millions of songs, playlists and albums.

ITranslate

17k reviews, 4.6 star rating

As the name suggests this is a translation app. Features include text and website translations by using your smartphone camera lens,  as well as voice to voice translations in over 100 languages. There are offline capabilities, dictionaries including synonyms and meanings and a phrasebook with over 250 predefined phrases.

Kindle

86k reviews, 4.8 star rating

For the voracious readers amongst us and those knowing that carrying paperbacks whilst travelling is just going to weigh you down. Download all your favourites, as ebooks, and have them all stored electronically on your device, ready to go.

Flight Board

1.8k reviews, 4.6 star rating

Turn your phone into the airport flight board. View, check and track flight status arrivals and departures, in real time. 16k airports and 1400 airlines are on the app. Never miss a flight again

Headspace: Meditation & Sleep

87k reviews, 4.8 star rating

Headspace is all about mindfulness, mediation, managing stress and anxiety, lifting productivity and helping you sleep better.

There are hundreds of guided meditations on a wide range of subjects starting from 2 minutes all the way up to 8 hours of sleep sounds if you’re a restless sleeper.

The perfect way to start a busy day of sightseeing or travel and an even better way to unwind into a restful nights sleep

Let me know some of your best apps for travel in the comments.

This post contains affiliate links. For more information about affiliate links and how they work please visit here

Don’t forget to Pin me for later!

Sharing is caring!