The Organized Dad: TripIt vs Wanderlog - Battle of the Travel Organization Apps!

Digital Travel Organization

I'm the type of dad that does a lot of research and planning before our trip. Having a digital itinerary, all my travel documents, tickets, reservations handy in an organized place on my phone can make family travels way less stressful.

From airline tickets to hotel reservations, scheduled transportation, attraction tickets, restaurant reservations, among other things, I end up with a lot of email confirmations, PDF files, and E-tickets on any given trip. I also like to have at least a rough outline of our daily itinerary so we make the most out of each day.

In the past, I have used old-school approaches like spreadsheets and digital file folders to organize my trips. Then came along Inbox by Google, an app released in 2014, as an alternative to the traditional Gmail app. Inbox by Google had amazing trip organization built-in. It would automatically organize all your trip-related emails, tickets, and reservations in one spot. It automatically created an itinerary based on your reservations and everything was linked to the appropriate emails and attachments.

Google discontinued Inbox in 2019, moving many of its features over to the Gmail app. Sadly, the same trip organization feature has not yet made it to the Gmail app.

I've been left longing for an adequate replacement.

TripIt vs Wanderlog

The top two travel organization apps for your phone are TripIt and Wanderlog.

TripIt is a veteran app that's been around for over 15 years. Wanderlog is a newer alternative that's been around since 2019.

Both of these apps offer free and paid "Pro" plans, and a yearly subscription costs $49.99 for either.

I tried out both of these apps in free and Pro versions. While each has its own pros and cons, there's one clear winner for me.

TripIt

Pros:

• Email sync, email forwarding, automatic or manual trip organization

• Attach documents to have all your trip documents organized in one place

• Clean, easy to read user interface.

• Excellent Pro features including airport maps, international tools, points tracker.

Cons:

• No research function

• Doesn't have a "places" list function.

• Requires a paid Pro subscription ($49.99/yearly) to get the best functionality.

Wanderlog

Pros:

• Email sync, email forwarding, automatic or manual trip organization

• Attach documents to have all your trip documents organized in one place

• Useful research tools and can read reviews in the app

• Create a list of places you are interested in visiting

Cons:

• Interface can be cluttered

• More difficult to read timeline

• Requires a paid Pro subscription ($49.99/yearly) to get the best functionality.

• Pro features and AI are less useful

Now let's get into the details...

TripIt:

I really enjoy the simplicity and clean look of the TripIt app.

It creates a very organized timeline itinerary with all of your events. Each itinerary item can be opened up to show more details, attached documents, emails, location information, etc.

You can create itinerary items manually or TripIt can create them automatically from emails.

It can sync with your email account and automatically scan for trip-related emails. This is very similar to what Google's Inbox app did. Personally, however, I feel a little uncomfortable giving a third-party app full access to scan all of my emails.

The alternative I chose to use was email forwarding. You simply forward any trip-related emails to TripIt, and the app will create the items for you with copies of the emails attached.

The free version did a decent job for a short trip but has a lot of limitations. The Pro version is $49.99 per year and adds a lot of useful features. The free version only allows 3 attachments per trip, while Pro is unlimited. Pro also adds live flight status tracking, a reward points tracker, detailed airport maps, alternative flight search, and useful international travel guides.

I think the airport map feature is excellent. The maps are very detailed, load fast, and have a good search function.

TripIt has simple, easy-to-read international information on each country.

It includes an easy way to access useful information like time zone, currency conversion, electric sockets, driving information, immunization requirements, and tipping customs.

TripIt does have some limitations. The user interface isn't very flashy and won't load images or reviews from places you add. It doesn't have a useful way to research for your trips. It doesn't load any reviews or information of hotels, restaurants, or activities. It doesn't really have a way to create a list of places you are interested in; instead, you just add places you are planning to visit into your itinerary.

Wanderlog:

Wanderlog, on the other hand, offers a lot of research options. You can search for things to do on your trips. You can access descriptions and reviews of hotels, restaurants, and activities.

These can be saved on your list of things to do, and then added to an itinerary. There are also articles and user-created guides that can help you plan your trip.

Wanderlog Pro also costs $49.99 per year. Similar to TripIt, the Pro membership adds a lot of useful functionality. Wanderlog Pro also comes with an AI assistant that can come up with ideas and suggestions for you. I found the AI assistant fun to plan around with, but ultimately, it didn't help me all that much. Even after telling the AI assistant all the things I wanted to do, it never could get the itinerary just how I wanted.

Wanderlog also offers email sync and email forwarding features. I again elected to forward my emails to Wanderlog rather than give them access to scan my entire inbox.

Wanderlog did a good job of taking forwarded emails and adding them to my itinerary with attachments.

Wanderlog allows you to search and create a list of the places you are interested in.

As far as making an organized itinerary, I feel that Wanderlog's interface is too cluttered and doesn't give me the clean organized trip overview that I want.

In my opinion, Wanderlog's timeline has too much going on, with spots to add additional places and a list of recommended places in between each day of the trip.

I strongly prefer TripIt's cleaner, organized appearance.

Wanderlog doesn't have airport maps, international country guides, or the points tracker function like TripIt.

Winner: TripIt!

For me, TripIt was the winner.

Ultimately though, it depends on what you are looking for.

If you are looking for trip ideas and want help organizing your trip research, Wanderlog can help. However, if you're looking for an organized itinerary and useful tools for your trip, TripIt stands out. TripIt's user interface appears simple and easy to use, yet is very powerful and feature-rich. It creates a very organized, easy-to-read trip timeline. Each item in the timeline can be opened up to reveal details, confirmation emails, and attached tickets or other documents.

The main features that TripIt lacks in comparison to Wanderlog are research functions and the ability to create a list of places you are interested in visiting. However, I found that just using a search engine along with Google Maps fulfilled my research needs much better than Wanderlog. Google Maps allows you to create lists of places and share them with your spouse or travel partners.

My preference is to combine TripIt for organization along with Google Maps for research.

For $49.99 per year, I think TripIt Pro's added functionality with unlimited attachments, live flight tracking, airport maps, and international tools is a good value. I would certainly recommend the Pro subscription if you plan multiple trips every year.