Things have moved on significantly we’ve found when travelling, downloading apps are so much easier than trying to work out where to go based on travel books or local guides as sometimes you need information on the go and who doesn’t carry their smartphone with them these days?

From planning your itinerary to booking your accommodation we’ve got the top apps in 2019 that you can download to save time and give you vital information on the go.

Skyscanner- Flights, Hotels, Trains and Car Hire

When looking for holidays the first thing we usually look for are the flights. The Skyscanner app has been our number 1 ever since our first holiday. Instead of searching through multiple sites for cheap flights Skyscanner will bring all your flight options in one app. The user interface is easy to view with their colour coded calendar and chart views. The app also lets you find the cheapest month and select the best flight from all major airlines such as British Airways, Ryanair, Cathay Pacific, Qantas, Emirates and many more.

TripAdvisor Hotels Flights Restaurants Attractions

I can’t tell you the amount of times TripAdvisor has come to the rescue whilst travelling. Whenever we travel and we’re looking for a place to stay, eat or book an excursion, we look to TripAdvisor for recommendations and reviews from real people. Prior to travelling we search the best of everything we want to do and build our travel plans. TripAdvisor is a well-respected platform for reviews.

TripScout – City Trip Planner & Travel Itinerary

This TripScout app is designed to help you find more unique places in the countries you love. If you want easy ways to find local bars, experience local cuisines, explore inspirational places to take photographs or even eat where the local chefs eat, this app is for you! The app works completely offline for those annoying moments when you don’t have access to roaming data. One of the key features we absolutely loved about this app was that you can download a guide for a city and you can filter it based on categories such as ‘Best for Instagram’. This will tell you where the best hot spots are for Instagram picture locations.

Google Trips – Travel Planner

This Google Trips app works in sync with your Gmail account. If you have sent all your travel confirmations to your Gmail, the app will collect all your travel information for you and help you make a personalised travel plan based on your reservations. You can then customize this how you want through the app. For instance, if you have asked your taxi driver to take you to your hotel and they have dropped you off in an unfamiliar place, you can find way your way easily as the app will store your hotel reservation.

Culture Trip: Explore & Travel

The Culture Trip app is for those who are interested in discovering the unique culture of a destination. Pretty cool if you are into vintage shops, amazing restaurants and history of the local area. The recommendations in the app are by real people who have visited the destination. This app helps build the excitement of an impending trip as it has guides on various cultural topics relating to your destination. If you are like us, we love reading about the culture in a location and the app always gives us an informative background on the area.

Expedia Hotels, Flights & Car Rental Travel Deals

This app is very popular, and most people know about Expedia. This trusted app allows you to book bundle deals such as selecting the perfect hotel and ideal flight but also keeping an eye on deals. We often use Expedia to find competitive deals. Expedia will be your new travel companion and will keep you in the loop. Receive important deal alerts, when you need them.

Google Translate

Have you ever been in a different country struggling to communicate? When we were in Thailand, we found it difficult to tell the chef that we wanted our food without shrimp! This was when we started researching and thinking it would be good idea if there was a digital translator. That’s when we discovered Google Translate.

The app can translate between 103 languages by typing, offline 59 different languages without the need for internet. You can even use camera mode and take pictures of language and it will translate the text. The best feature is conversation mode where you can have a two-way conversation in 32 languages. There is also a phrase book where you can save most used phrases for future reference. This is app is must have before travelling.

Guides by Lonely Planet

Before travelling we like to do our research on the places we are going, so we always have something interesting to do. This app by Lonely Planet lets you download city guides to read about, they are written by authors with a descriptive approach. Not forgetting offline maps, phrase books and currency converters to use. If you want to know how cheap or expensive a city or country is, then this app also gives you guidance on budget, travel options and time.

Hostelworld: Hostels & Cheap Hotels Travel App

Are you travelling on a budget? It’s not always about the most expensive posh hotels. Sometimes you can have the best travel experience through accommodation such as hostels. There are many boutique luxury hostels around the world. There is a big mis-conception that hostels are dirty and dangerous, however through this trusted app by HostelWorld you can see reviews and pictures of the hostels with peace of mind. Hostels are often half the price of hotels!

Airbnb

Have you ever struggled to find a last-minute hotel or found they are fully booked? This is where Airbnb comes to the rescue. Airbnb lets you rent vacation homes anywhere in the world. Book a listing using the same secure payment platform as airbnb.com. You can also check your itinerary, communicate with the host and locate your listing on the go. Choose from over 4 million vacation rentals across 191+ countries. You can search by things such as neighbourhood, amenities and more.