Smart Travel Apps for a Mobile Generation

The smartphone could have been built
specifically for the travel industry. As a device that travels with us
everywhere, helps us find hotel rooms, books flights, plan excursions, maps our
routes, and inspires our future journeys, it’s difficult to image traveling
without a smartphone. This is before we even take a moment to consider how many
devices we no longer have to pack because of the smartphone — the camera, audio
player, laptop, eBook reader are all consigned to history. Seriously, the only
thing left to integrate with a smartphone that would make it the perfect travel
companion is the hairdryer (although we may be some way away from that
innovation just yet).

It’s, therefore, no surprise that travel
apps are big business on smartphones. With this in mind, the team at Digital
Turbine decided to collate a list of some of our favorite travel apps — the
kind of thing that you really shouldn’t leave home without.

The
Full-Service Travel App

For some journeys, you just want all your
travel arrangements to be managed in one place. The full-service travel app is
the smartphone equivalent of your old bricks ‘n’ mortar travel agency where you
could package up flights, accommodation, car rental, and a full range of other
travel-related services in a one-stop-shop type environment.

The vast majority of these apps are managed
by big names in the online travel sector and will already be very familiar to
both frequent and occasional travelers alike. They include:

• Expedia: Hotels, flights, cars,
  activities, and bundled deals. Expedia
  helps you plan, book and manage your whole trip on one app.
• Priceline: Exclusive app-only travel deals. Priceline
  is rated by Travel + Leisure magazine
  as a Best App for Travelers!

Travel
Price Comparison Apps

Offering a more flexible travel solution
for more flexible travelers, travel price comparison apps enable users to
compare and contrast offers from hundreds of travel sites, helping them find
the best possible deal to suit their individual needs. If you are not tied to a
specific date or time, these apps can help you find some incredible deals:

• Kayak: Discover
  mobile-only deals, view your trip details on the go, and search hundreds of
  travel sites with one tap on the Kayak app.
• Hotwire: The Hotwire app helps travelers save more byoffering unsold travel inventory at
  discounted prices.
• TripAdvisor: More than just a review service. Discover and
  book amazing things to do while you travel, with recommendations from
  TripAdvisor’s global community on the TripAdvisor app.
• WeGo: Compare travel options from hundreds
  of travel sites on one simple screen. A truly global service The WeGo app
  is available in a huge variety of languages.
• Hopper: Watch your next flight and get a notification as soon as the
  price drops to its lowest point.Users
  save on average $50 per flight by following the Hopper app’s advice.

Low-Cost
Airlines

Sometimes you just need a seat on a flight
and the new breed of low-cost airlines have done more to make this as
affordable as possible to the widest range of travelers than anyone else. By
selling seats direct to the public (reducing agency commissions), introducing
paperless travel (e-Tickets and mobile boarding passes), and charging for
extras on top of their no-frills service, low-cost airlines have completely
disrupted the aviation industry. Now with the right smartphone app, jumping on
a flight can be as cheap and easy as taking a bus.

• JetBlue: Book flights, change seats,
  check-in and download your boarding pass with the JetBlue app.
• SouthWest: Book and manage your flight
  and car rental services, check your flight status and boarding info, access
  reward points, view travel and weather alerts with the SouthWest app.

Accommodation
Only

So, you’ve booked your flight with a
low-cost carrier? You’re going to need somewhere to stay. Accommodation only is
an incredibly crowded sector of the app travel market. This is great news for those
of us looking to save some money on hotel rooms, apartments, and guest houses
because the availability of choice has never wider.

• Airbnb: Unforgettable travel
  experiences start with the Airbnb app. Find travel
  adventures and new places to go far away or near to you, and access vacation
  home rentals, new experiences, and places to visit all around the world.
• HomeAway: Find and book the perfect holiday
  rental in just a few taps. With the HomeAway
  app, you can quickly and easily access all the tools you need to plan, book
  and manage your stay.
• Trivago: Compare hotels & find your
  ideal hotel at a great price before you book with the Trivago
  app.
• Booking.com: Check in with your digital
  confirmation, manage your bookings on the go and travel with ease with the Booking.com app.

Airport
Parking

Nobody in their right mind parks at the
airport without pre-booking first. These apps will ensure that your cars stay
at the airport isn’t as expensive as your vacation.

• ParkWhiz: Find parking anywhere, compare
  prices and pick the place that’s best for you, and save up to 50% off standard
  rates with the ParkWhiz app.
• WeSmartPark: A little local knowledge
  goes a long way. The WeSmartPark
  app can help you find the perfect parking spot in Barcelona and Madrid in
  Spain orSantiago in Chile.

Car
Rental

After clearing customs and collecting your
luggage, you can never underestimate the convenience of having a car waiting
for you at the airport. Thankfully, there are a number of apps available to
make sure that happens.

• Enterprise Rent-a-Car: Easily view or
  modify upcoming reservations, get directions to a rental branch, call roadside
  assistance or find a hire car for your next trip at one of 7,000+ worldwide
  locations with the Enterprise
  Rent-a-Car app.
• Easyrentcars: No matter where you are,
  you can always rent a car with the Easyrentcars app
  until the last minute before pick-up. And you can manage your booking anywhere,
  anytime.

Travel
Inspiration and Management

If all of this talk about travel has
inspired you to hit the road, the following apps are available to help you plan
your next trip.

• Roadtrippers: Billed as the only map
  built for travelers, the Roadtrippers
  app helps you plan your summer road trip with friends or find an amazing
  place nearby you never knew existed.
• Culture Trip: Get a feel for what makes
  a place special through local writers, filmmakers, and creatorswith the Culture Trip app.Discover everything from experiences,
  to hotels and restaurants and more.
• Tripit: It doesn’t matter where you
  book, the TripIt app can manage it all. As soon as you book a flight, hotel,
  car or other reservation, simply forward it to [email protected] and it’s
  instantly added to your master itinerary.

Make
Sure Your Travel App Goes Further

Could your app do with a break? At
DigitalTurbine we have availability on the hottest devices and most sought
after networks. To learn how your travel app could fly first class and avoid
all those nasty queues in the app store equivalent of departures, talk to one
of our pre-loading experts today.