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Compare flights from 100s of sites.

Big names, great deals, filter for what you want, track prices, more than flights, start your travel planning here, search flights , hotels & rental cars.

• Hi New York City Hostel $58+
• West Side Ymca $106+
• Pod 51 $159+
• Radio Hotel $162+
• Pod Times Square $170+
• OYO Times Square $175+
• The Gallivant Times Square $176+
• Pod 39 $180+
• The Washington $182+
• Paramount Times Square $192+
• DoubleTree by Hilton New York Downtown $197+
• Westgate New York Grand Central $201+
• DoubleTree by Hilton New York Times Square West $202+
• The Manhattan at Times Square Hotel $209+
• The New Yorker A Wyndham Hotel $211+
• Flight Fort Lauderdale - Newark (FLL - EWR) $39+
• Flight Atlanta - New York (ATL - LGA) $42+
• Flight Miami - Newark (MIA - EWR) $49+
• Flight Chicago - New York (ORD - LGA) $59+
• Flight Fort Lauderdale - New York (FLL - LGA) $61+
• Flight Miami - New York (MIA - LGA) $62+
• Flight Dallas - Newark (DFW - EWR) $65+
• Flight Atlanta - Newark (ATL - EWR) $72+
• Flight Dallas - New York (DFW - LGA) $75+
• Flight Houston - New York (HOU - LGA) $80+
• Flight Orlando - New York (MCO - LGA) $81+
• Flight Orlando - Newark (MCO - EWR) $87+
• Flight Tampa - New York (TPA - LGA) $89+
• Flight Miami - New York (MIA - JFK) $115+
• Flight Fort Lauderdale - New York (FLL - JFK) $116+
• Monumental Movieland Hotel $51+
• Grand Hotel Kissimmee At Celebration $54+
• Ramada Plaza by Wyndham Orlando Resort & Suites Intl Drive $68+
• Flight Atlanta - Orlando (ATL - MCO) $25+
• Flight Raleigh - Orlando (RDU - MCO) $48+
• Flight Cleveland - Orlando (CLE - MCO) $50+
• Book A Bed Hostels $23+
• Generator London $34+
• Palmers Lodge Swiss Cottage $35+
• Nx London Hostel $38+
• Flight Boston - London (BOS - LHR) $323+
• Flight Los Angeles - London (LAX - LHR) $330+
• Flight New York - London (JFK - LGW) $380+
• Flight Chicago - London (ORD - LHR) $381+

Fort Lauderdale

• Red Carpet Inn Airport Fort Lauderdale $66+
• Fort Lauderdale Grand Hotel $66+
• Days Inn by Wyndham Fort Lauderdale Airport Cruise Port $68+
• Flight Atlanta - Fort Lauderdale (ATL - FLL) $39+
• Flight Philadelphia - Fort Lauderdale (PHL - FLL) $39+
• Flight Baltimore - Fort Lauderdale (BWI - FLL) $40+
• Green Tortoise Hostel Seattle $64+
• Travelodge by Wyndham Seattle By The Space Needle $175+
• Coast Gateway Hotel $177+
• Flight Ontario - Seattle (ONT - SEA) $52+
• Flight Los Angeles - Seattle (LAX - SEA) $61+
• Flight Phoenix - Seattle (PHX - SEA) $80+
• Fabhotel Royal Residency Ii $21+
• Taj Mahal Hotel Abids $25+
• The Altruist Business Hotel Hitech $27+
• Flight New York - Mumbai (JFK - BOM) $593+
• Flight Chicago - New Delhi (ORD - DEL) $687+
• Flight New York - New Delhi (JFK - DEL) $698+
• Smile Hotel Premium Sapporo Susukino $43+
• Sapporo Tokyu Rei Hotel $47+
• Best Western Sapporo Odori Koen $48+
• Flight Los Angeles - Tokyo (LAX - NRT) $568+
• Flight San Francisco - Tokyo (SFO - NRT) $645+
• Flight Seattle - Tokyo (SEA - NRT) $762+
• Kuhio Banyan Club $108+
• Royal Grove Waikiki $121+
• Ohia Waikiki Studio Suites $130+
• Flight Los Angeles - Honolulu (LAX - HNL) $187+
• Flight San Francisco - Honolulu (SFO - HNL) $194+
• Flight San Jose - Honolulu (SJC - HNL) $204+
• Super 8 by Wyndham Dallas Love Field Airport $51+
• Dallas Love Field Inn $53+
• Wyndham Garden Dallas North $61+
• Flight Fort Lauderdale - Dallas (FLL - DFW) $40+
• Flight Miami - Dallas (MIA - DFW) $40+
• Flight Chicago - Dallas (MDW - DFW) $54+
• The STRAT Hotel, Casino & Tower $15+
• Harrah's Las Vegas Hotel & Casino $21+
• OYO Hotel And Casino Las Vegas $22+
• Silver Sevens Hotel & Casino $37+
• Flight Los Angeles - Las Vegas (LAX - LAS) $34+
• Flight Burbank - Las Vegas (BUR - LAS) $39+
• Flight Oakland - Las Vegas (OAK - LAS) $42+
• Flight San Francisco - Las Vegas (SFO - LAS) $46+
• Freehand Chicago $41+
• Chicago Getaway Hostel $60+
• Travelodge by Wyndham Downtown Chicago $128+
• Flight Boston - Chicago (BOS - ORD) $40+
• Flight Atlanta - Chicago (ATL - MDW) $47+
• Flight Dallas - Chicago (DFW - MDW) $50+

San Francisco

• Hi San Francisco Downtown Hostel $47+
• The Mosser $68+
• Axiom Hotel $125+
• Flight Ontario - San Francisco (ONT - SFO) $46+
• Flight Santa Ana - San Francisco (SNA - SFO) $48+
• Flight Los Angeles - San Francisco (LAX - SFO) $62+

Washington, D.C.

• Generator Hotel Washington DC $44+
• Days Inn by Wyndham Washington DC/Connecticut Avenue $101+
• Citizenm Washington DC Noma $132+
• Citizenm Washington Dc Capitol $136+
• Motto by Hilton Washington DC City Center $137+
• Henley Park Hotel $141+
• Omni Shoreham Hotel $144+
• Washington Plaza Hotel $144+
• Beacon Hotel & Corporate Quarters $147+
• Hyatt Place Washington DC/US Capitol $147+
• Hamilton Hotel - Washington DC $151+
• Georgetown Residences by Luxurban $158+
• Flight Orlando - Baltimore (MCO - BWI) $53+
• Flight Tampa - Baltimore (TPA - BWI) $54+
• Flight Atlanta - Baltimore (ATL - BWI) $56+
• Flight Boston - Baltimore (BOS - BWI) $61+
• Flight Dallas - Baltimore (DFW - BWI) $86+
• Flight Chicago - Baltimore (ORD - BWI) $95+
• Flight Houston - Baltimore (HOU - BWI) $109+
• Flight Los Angeles - Baltimore (LAX - BWI) $131+
• Flight Boston - Washington, D.C. (BOS - DCA) $133+
• Flight Houston - Washington, D.C. (HOU - DCA) $138+
• Flight Boston - Washington, D.C. (BOS - IAD) $139+
• Flight Dallas - Washington, D.C. (DFW - DCA) $142+
• Hotel Casa Mallorca $54+
• Wyndham Garden Cancun Downtown $66+
• Suites Malecon Cancun $80+
• Flight Dallas - Cancún (DFW - CUN) $174+
• Flight Fort Lauderdale - Cancún (FLL - CUN) $182+
• Flight Houston - Cancún (HOU - CUN) $196+

United States

• Flight Newark - Fort Lauderdale (EWR - FLL) $40+
• Flight Newark - Miami (EWR - MIA) $40+
• Tip Top Motel Cafe & Bakery $153+
• Kauai Palms Hotel $189+
• Kauai Inn $240+
• Flight Los Angeles - Hawaii (LAX - USHI) $187+
• Flight San Francisco - Hawaii (SFO - USHI) $194+
• Flight San Jose - Hawaii (SJC - USHI) $204+
• Stay Classy $56+
• California Suites Hotel $96+
• Super 8 by Wyndham San Diego Hotel Circle $99+
• Flight Oakland - San Diego (OAK - SAN) $50+
• Flight San Jose - San Diego (SJC - SAN) $50+
• Flight Houston - San Diego (HOU - SAN) $60+
• Shared Living Not A Hotel $32+
• Super 8 by Wyndham Phoenix West $49+
• HomeTowne Studios by Red Roof Phoenix - Black Canyon Highway $55+
• Flight Ontario - Phoenix (ONT - PHX) $41+
• Flight Dallas - Phoenix (DFW - PHX) $53+
• Flight Portland - Phoenix (PDX - PHX) $64+

Los Angeles

• Boutique Hostel $34+
• Freehand Los Angeles $49+
• City Center Hotel $100+
• Rotex Western Inn $107+
• Four Points by Sheraton Los Angeles International Airport $110+
• The Dixie Hollywood $119+
• USC Hotel $128+
• Flight Oakland - Los Angeles (OAK - LAX) $39+
• Flight Denver - Los Angeles (DEN - LAX) $48+
• Flight Seattle - Los Angeles (SEA - LAX) $61+
• Flight Phoenix - Los Angeles (PHX - LAX) $62+
• Flight Salt Lake City - Los Angeles (SLC - LAX) $62+
• Flight San Francisco - Los Angeles (SFO - LAX) $63+
• Flight Portland - Los Angeles (PDX - LAX) $69+
• Selina Gold Dust $50+
• La Quinta Inn by Wyndham Miami Airport North $69+
• Motel 6 Miami. Fl $78+
• Miami Gardens Inn & Suites $80+
• La Quinta Inn & Suites by Wyndham Miami Airport East $81+
• Days Inn by Wyndham Miami International Airport $85+
• Life House, Little Havana $94+
• Holiday Inn Miami West - Airport Area $96+
• Holiday Inn Miami-Doral Area, An IHG Hotel $102+
• Staybridge Suites Miami International Airport $106+
• Holiday Inn Express & Suites Miami-Kendall $107+
• Flight Baltimore - Miami (BWI - MIA) $33+
• Flight Philadelphia - Miami (PHL - MIA) $39+
• Flight Detroit - Miami (DTW - MIA) $40+
• Flight Atlanta - Miami (ATL - MIA) $50+
• Flight Chicago - Miami (ORD - MIA) $50+
• Flight Charlotte - Miami (CLT - MIA) $52+
• Flight Houston - Miami (HOU - MIA) $58+
• Flight Houston - Miami (IAH - MIA) $58+
• Flight Chicago - Miami (MDW - MIA) $60+
• Flight Dallas - Miami (DFW - MIA) $60+
• Hometowne Studios by Red Roof Denver - Glendale/Cherry Creek $68+
• Super 8 by Wyndham Denver Stapleton $77+
• Baymont by Wyndham Denver International Airport $87+
• La Quinta Inn & Suites By Wyndham Denver Airport Dia $105+
• Microtel Inn & Suites by Wyndham Denver Airport $109+
• Renu On Wazee $120+
• Renaissance Denver Central Park Hotel $126+
• Flight Austin - Denver (AUS - DEN) $48+
• Flight Chicago - Denver (MDW - DEN) $53+
• Flight Ontario - Denver (ONT - DEN) $53+
• Flight Chicago - Denver (ORD - DEN) $67+
• Flight Baltimore - Denver (BWI - DEN) $68+
• Flight Houston - Denver (HOU - DEN) $72+
• Flight Houston - Denver (IAH - DEN) $72+
• Hi Boston Hostel $65+
• Ramada by Wyndham Boston $147+
• The Revolution Hotel $171+
• Flight Chicago - Boston (ORD - BOS) $50+
• Flight Baltimore - Boston (BWI - BOS) $61+
• Flight Charlotte - Boston (CLT - BOS) $62+
• Ramada Plaza by Wyndham Atlanta Airport $63+
• La Quinta Inn & Suites by Wyndham Atlanta Airport North $96+
• Sonesta Atlanta Airport North $98+
• Flight Orlando - Atlanta (MCO - ATL) $25+
• Flight Chicago - Atlanta (MDW - ATL) $37+
• Flight Newark - Atlanta (EWR - ATL) $38+
• Generator Madrid $25+
• Toc Hostel Madrid $33+
• C&h Aravaca Garden $39+
• Flight New York - Barcelona (JFK - BCN) $312+
• Flight Newark - Barcelona (EWR - BCN) $321+
• Rodeway Inn Fairgrounds-Casino $65+
• Econo Lodge Airport at RJ Stadium $69+
• Tampa Inn Near Busch Gardens $71+
• Flight Baltimore - Florida (BWI - USFL) $33+
• Flight Newark - Florida (EWR - USFL) $40+
• Flight Atlanta - Florida (ATL - USFL) $50+
• Flight Atlanta - Tampa (ATL - TPA) $44+
• Flight Raleigh - Tampa (RDU - TPA) $47+
• Flight Baltimore - Tampa (BWI - TPA) $48+

New Orleans

• Super 8 by Wyndham New Orleans $51+
• Maison Saint Charles by Hotel RL $84+
• Hampton Inn and Suites New Orleans Convention Center $91+
• Flight Dallas - New Orleans (DFW - MSY) $37+
• Flight Houston - New Orleans (HOU - MSY) $41+
• Flight Fort Lauderdale - New Orleans (FLL - MSY) $44+

Frequently asked questions about KAYAK

How do i find travel deals on kayak.

Simply use one of our travel search engines to scan for prices gathered from hundreds of travel sites. KAYAK’s search results pages have loads of filter options to help you find deals, discover exactly what you’re looking for and make booking seamless. Plus, there’s no extra fee from KAYAK.

What makes KAYAK a great travel app?

On the KAYAK app for iOS and Android you’ll find all the great travel offers found on the website and much more. There are special mobile rates and app only deals that allow you to save even more money. Plus, you can get notifications straight to your phone letting you know when prices for your next trip have dropped. But the KAYAK app is much more than just a travel app. Use the Trips function to manage your travel itinerary and get up to date status alerts on flights, check-in changes and to store your boarding pass. Even if you’re in the middle of nowhere on your travels, you can still access your travel notes via Trips, as no internet connection is required.

How can I use KAYAK to manage my travel bookings?

KAYAK Trips creates a travel itinerary for you that will give you flight status alerts, can be shared with friends and more. Simply forward your booking confirmations to [email protected] or use the KAYAK app and sync your email account to keep all your travel plans organized in one app, even if you didn’t book with KAYAK. You can share your holiday plans with friends and family and also check out your travel stats for past vacations, like how far you’ve traveled, your most popular cities and how many times you’ve traveled around the world. Even if you don’t have signal, don’t worry, as you can access Trips to check out your itineraries whilst on the road. Your data is safe and secure with us and you won’t have to re-enter credit card info when booking future trips. If you want to make changes or cancel bookings, then you should contact the travel provider, which is provided on the booking confirmation.

What are KAYAK Price Alerts?

Instead of manually checking back in on the price of your next flight or stay, let KAYAK do the hard work for you with KAYAK Price Alerts. Once you’ve saved your search, our data will determine how the price will rise or fluctuate over the coming days. You’ll then get a push notification letting you know when’s the perfect time to book.

Search flights , hotels , rental cars , travel guides and more with KAYAK. KAYAK searches hundreds of other travel sites at once to get you the information you need to make the right decisions.

Best online travel sites 2022

Use the best online travel sites to plan your trip ahead of time so you can enjoy your time away.

• Buying advice
• Testing process

The best online travel sites are wonderful not only plan your next trip for peace of mind, they're also a fun way to get excited ahead of your next adventure. You can simply go to one site and plan most of your trip's main parts from flights and hotels to rental cars and excursions. If what you're after is just hotel bookings, check out our list of the best hotel booking sites .

While what many of these sites offer is similar, it's the way in which they do it which is important. The last thing you need is a stress-inducing website when planning to go away to relax and unwind. So we've reviewed the best sites based on their price, of course, but also on the way they work, with the ease of use and clarity as important features. We also checked to make sure you won't suffer any extra charges added on top at the last minute. Plus, we took rewards schemes into account, which could help you save money upfront or in the longer term if you use some sites more than once.

With all that in mind, these are the very best online travel sites out there right now.

The best online travel sites

1. expedia.com: best online travel site overall .

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Expedia is a big name in online travel sites and hotel booking services and owns many popular sites like Hotels.com and Hotwire.com. We're fans of the original, though, thanks to its clean and straightforward to use interface. Hit the packages section of the site, and you can add up to five connecting flights, choose to add accommodation for all of or only part of your trip, and tag on car rentals too. 

It's all suitably well laid out, and it only takes a few seconds to start putting together your itinerary. However, we do wish there were a few more options for filtering out accessibility issues. Still, for most people, Expedia.com has everything they'll need, and there's even the option of a cruise too if you fancy it. It's as aspirational to look at as it is useful to, well, use and there are extra discounts for booking multiple parts of your vacation with the site. A Things To Do section rounds off the site's bid to help you plan your entire trip in one place.

2. Booking.com: Best for ease of use

Booking.com

Booking.com is a giant in the world of holiday bookings and not only offers over half a million properties in more than 207 countries but also offers flights and car rental services too. As such you can do it all from this one spot which makes it a very easy-to-use option. That said, there is a lot going on, and the user interface can be a little overwhelming at times. 

But with a superb rewards program, it is a great option that encourages you to keep coming back, making it easier to use as you become accustomed. You can even sort your taxi hire from this site meaning there is very little to think about when you get traveling as it's all been planned ahead of time. You also don't have to pay a booking fee on lots of hotels, allowing you to remain flexible – ideal if you're traveling about a lot on your journey.

3. CheapTickets.com: Best for finding things to do 

CheapTickets.com

CheapTickets is another site acquired by Expedia, but it does things a little differently. You can easily add on flight, hotel, and car or any combination of the three for package deals, although multiple flights are under a different option. So far, so Expedia (if less intuitive), but you can also clearly purchase event tickets from the site, which is far more useful if you want a one-stop-shop place to buy your trip. It's something other sites provide, but CheapTickets is that bit keener to entice you into the process, even if the site itself is a little cheesier looking than others. 

There's also the site's Vacation Value Finder, which lets you tweak how much you're willing to spend and what you're looking for from a vacation before making some fun suggestions. It's perfect for finding a last-minute deal if you don't have your heart set on one place. Students will also appreciate a section dedicated to them with extra discounts once you verify you're a student. All in all, it's a great varied site for numerous different needs. 

4. Priceline.com: Best for user reviews 

Priceline.com

Priceline is a big deal in the online travel site world for a good reason. It's effortless to use with options available for flights, cars, hotels, or any combination of the three. It's mildly annoying that Priceline's super cheap Pricebreaker deals don't extend to bundles, so you won't get an incredible bargain like you would if you booked separately. However, combining the set is still a worthwhile deal with discounts offered for the more you bundle together. 

One thing we really appreciated is that every hotel we looked at had dozens of reviews, and they're all from verified customers. It takes seconds to gain a reasonably accurate picture of what to expect from wherever you're considering booking. That's the perfect peace of mind when you're booking online, and you can't be sure of what you're getting without user reviews backing hotel statements up. Clearly laid out, you can focus on enjoying rather than worrying. Finally, Priceline is keen to make its VIP scheme easily accessible with straightforward discounts offered to you over time -- something that not all sites so clearly highlight. 

5. Kayak.com: Best for aggregated results 

If you're short on time, Kayak is pretty useful. That's because you simply enter where you want to go, and it aggregates results from multiple different sources. While it means you never book directly with Kayak, it does mean you get results quickly and without having to search around yourself, even if you will feel a bit overwhelmed with adverts while you search. 

The site itself looks a little basic, but under the hood is a surprising number of different filters (although no accessibility ones to speak of) and all the critical information you could require, although obviously you'll be sent to another site for the full details. The site also has a deals section, which has some great bargains for things you can do once you reach your destination, along with cheap car rental deals. It might not be pretty, but if you simply don't want to do the groundwork yourself, Kayak has you covered. It can be a real time-saver, and we reckon it's particularly useful if you're mostly researching possible trips in the future and want rough price estimates. Just watch out for the fact you can’t bundle in car rental deals. 

6. Hotwire.com: Best for renting properties 

Hotwire keeps things straightforward. All you need to do is enter what you're looking for, and a somewhat dated interface tells you what's available. It's not as pretty as some sites, but we really liked the extensive property type filters available. Want to stay on a houseboat or in a chalet at your destination? Hit the relevant filter, and you can find out if that's an option in the locale. That might not matter if your heart is set on a hotel, but it's a nice bonus even amongst the awkward site layout. 

Elsewhere, it's mostly business as usual, but that's no bad thing. Well laid out discounts are available to compare reasonably quickly, and most locations have plenty of reviews. If you feel like tracking down specific deals, you can do that too, with the site keen to offer up discounts to central locations if you're not quite sure where you'd like to visit next. It feels like the site needs updating when you compare it to its rivals, but it works well and speedily enough.

7. Agoda: Best for private home rental in Asia 

Agoda is a great option if you want to look for accommodation that isn't a hotel as this specializes in offering apartments and private rentals. In fact, there are dedicated market managers that work on finding properties, especially in Asia. As such you can find unique destination rentals at decent rates and should you change your mind there is a helpful 24-hour free cancellation policy in place. 

Everything is very easy to use and if you want to make more than one booking you can make great savings. Customer support is also a plus, as there is a 24-hour multilingual customer support service available when booking. With millions of reviews, Agoda makes finding a property very easy with a feeling of trust that can offer great peace of mind.

What to look for in an online travel site

Booking Travel Packages Travel packages can let you combine flights, hotel reservations and car rentals together for a better deal than booking separately. Some companies, like Priceline, pick hotels and flights for you, to get you to your destination for the lowest price. Other companies let you mix and match flights, hotels and car rentals to fit your schedule.

Booking Airfare One of the biggest reasons for searching on a travel site is to find cheap airfare. While there are dozens of airfare-specific websites, travel sites also give you the option to add hotel stays and car rentals. The best travel sites combine flight information from over nine different airlines and let you sort flights by price, number of stops, duration and flight class.

Booking International Travel Finding airfare for international travel is the easiest part of booking an overseas trip. AirGorilla helps you find accommodations and rent GPS units with your rental car, so you can find your way around. Often, sites will recommend hotels that are far from your actual destination or event. Searching for reservations on a site that gives accommodation recommendations will help you schedule an international trip with less stress.

How we tested the best online travel sites

We looked at how easy each site is to use during our testing, such as how quickly the site loaded and how easy it was to find what we were looking for. We considered whether the site felt cluttered with adverts or seemed like a dated interface. We also looked at how easy it was to find Contact Us pages, price guarantee information, and any kind of special deals section. 

We also considered how easily bundle deals could be arranged and how extensive they were and any potential discounts tied to them. We checked filter options to see how flexible and easy it was to look up different needs along the way.

We looked at trips between Los Angeles and Miami, Paris to Lisbon, and New York City to Los Angeles during testing. We also looked at lesser-known routes to see if they were also catered for appropriately.

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Jennifer has been freelancing for over 10 years. In the past, she's written about all things tech and gaming wise for outlets as varied as The Independent, Playboy, Eurogamer, and TechRadar. In her spare time, she spends far too much time watching films, attempting to train her pet guinea pigs, and mastering making the perfect burrito.  She's a full time freelancer, but a regular tech news contributor to Top Ten Reviews.

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60 Best travel websites for researching & planning a trip

Researching and planning a holiday is like decorating a room. It’s all about the preparation. (Yes, you can have a great spontaneous holiday, but there’s a lot of luck involved in that…).

In the good old days, before the internet, we relied on travel agents, but in today’s digital world, a wealth of online websites and apps are on-hand to help.

But too many. The choice is overwhelming and the quality and trustworthiness variable.

So which ones are the best? Which ones should you use and for what purpose?

Planning a holiday – even before you book it – involves several steps. We’ve broken down this process and recommended the best tools to use at each stage, to make your research and planning process as simple, painless, fast –and enjoyable – as possible.

Where to go & what to do

1.1 ideas & inspiration.

Discover new places you never thought of going to, wonderful things to see & do on your travels. Add them to your travel bucket list.

Bucket List Travels

Concept: This specialist travel inspiration site works with an impressive list of leading travel writers around the world to recommend the world’s greatest travel experiences. It also offers destination guides, simple itineraries that link the top attractions together, and recommends the best places to stay while you’re there. You can search and filter through the recommendations e.g. to find recommendations by price, or that are suitable for kids. You can also save your ‘finds’ to your travel bucket list.

Pros: the search and filtering is unique amongst travel inspiration sites, and it allows you to sort through the thousands of expert recommendations to find what you want quickly – a huge time saver. The destination guides have curated, not comprehensive recommendations, so they’re effectively handing you a list of great recommendations for when you visit a new destination, i.e. the ‘bucket list’ experiences not-to-be-missed. The adding to favourites is also unique – great for ‘saving for later’ those brilliant experiences or places to stay you come across.

Cons: coverage is limited to only 100 or so destinations, which mainly centres on the UK and western Europe. Non-Europe content is limited (but being added in the near future).

When to use: Use it before any other site to decide on where to go or what to do next, and to get an outline list/itinerary of what you want to do there. Then supplement that with tours & activities from other inspiration sites listed here, especially the ones with the local authentic experiences.

Website : https://www.bucketlisttravels.com/

Concept: Instagram is a social media platform that allows users to share photos and videos with their followers. It’s popular among individuals, influencers, and businesses for promoting their personal brands or products.

Pros: Insta is a great source of travel inspiration, as it allows you to discover new destinations, attractions, and experiences through visually appealing and engaging content. You can follow travel influencers and bloggers for tips and recommendations, discover lesser-known destinations and experiences, find out about local events and festivals, and see how others experience a particular destination, which can provide ideas for your own itinerary.

When to use it: Day-to-day inspiration and idea generation for your next trip. Bookmark your favourites, or save your ideas to your travel bucket list for the next time you do want to go somewhere special.

Website : https://www.instagram.com/

Concept: Pinterest is a social media platform that allows users to discover, collect and share images and videos on virtual pinboards. Users can create boards on any topic and save Pins from other users or external websites, as well as search for inspiration and ideas. The platform has over 400 million active users worldwide.

Pros: Like Instagram, it’s a great visual travel inspiration tool, for discovering what to do in the world and specific destinations.

When to use it: For visual searches of potential destinations, and saving ideas (pins) for future trips.

Website : https://www.pinterest.com

Travel & Leisure

This high-end, luxury travel magazine covers a range of topics including hotels and resorts, airlines, cruises, food and drink, and various travel destinations around the world. Being a magazine, it focuses on the new and topical, so it’s a showcase of the latest and greatest in travel if novelty is your thing.

Pros: It’s top-quality content and genuine expertise from leading journalists and travel writers, with selective, curated recommendations. They have tonnes of round-ups of the ‘world’s best’ too.

Cons: Recommendations can be a bit too curated, missing lots of smaller experiences, and are often outside of the budget of most travellers. It’s primarily a magazine with an online afterthought, so recommendations tend to get buried in long pages of text. The site search turns up articles/posts that you then have to read further, rather than specific recommendations, and you can’t filter anything which is the big time saver.

When to use it: Sign up for their social feeds and newsletters, which often feature great round-ups like: “Best place to…”. Great for day-to-day inspiration and idea generation for your next trip. Bookmark your favourites, or save your ideas to your travel bucket list for the next time you do want to go somewhere special.

Honourable mentions: other great magazines for this include Conde Nast Traveller (featured later) and Wanderlust .

Website : https://www.travelandleisure.com/

Travel blogs

Concept: Travel blogs (too many to mention, but pretty much all the same in format) feature personal experiences, advice, and recommendations, usually written by an individual traveller or group of travellers who share their travel stories, photos, and tips with their audience.

Pros: You can’t beat personal experience when it comes to travel recommendations, and often these experienced author-travellers offer good insights and tips. They’re also usually an interesting, engaging read.

Cons: for planning a trip, blogs are hit and miss. They are written from the perspective of the blogger i.e. where they have just been or what they have just done, so it’s pot luck if that coincides with where you want to go or do next. They are also flat, text articles – you can’t search or filter their recommendations.

When to use it: Follow the ones you like if you enjoy reading such things. Once you have your list itinerary roughly planned out, they’re worth a quick scan for additional tips and insights (if you can find something relevant).

1.2 Top attractions, activities, tours & events

If you’re ready to start planning your trip, and nothing on your travel bucket list fits the bill, take a look at one of these sites to decide:

Concept: See listing above.

When to use: Head to their search results that shows all 100+ destination they cover, then use the filters to select a destination based on cost (cheap v expensive), or theme  (e.g. Science & Nature, Art, History & Culture) etc. You can also handily filter the list according to the best month of the year to visit.

FlightsFrom

Concept: this handy website lists all of the destinations you can fly to from every airport, on what days and with what airline.

When to use it: great for identifying where you can fly to from your local airport, and planning multi-destination trips.

Website : https://www.flightsfrom.com/

Google Flights

Google’s flight aggregator and comparison service consolidates flight schedules from all of the world’s commercial airlines in one place. By entering your dates and departure/arrival airports, you can quickly see who flies there, on what dates and at what times, and the price of the fare. Prices and availability are updated in real-time, and you can sign up for price alerts.

How to use it: The ‘Explore’ function allows you to specify a departure airport and see the cheapest flights to any destination you can fly to from that airport, for certain dates and trip durations – so great if you don’t have a fixed destination in mind. You can also handily add more than one departure airport if you have more than one departure option. (NB FlightsFrom shows you all available flights; Google Flights shows you available flights and their prices). NB Skyscanner has a similar ‘Explore everywhere’ feature, however, it is only available on the app and you can only enter one departure destination).

Website : https://www.google.com/travel/flights

This travel inspiration website provides a wealth of travel content, including destination guides, hotel and restaurant recommendations.

Pros: there’s loads of decent quality content, and their network of experts worldwide have good credentials and specialise in the destinations they write about.

Cons: The recommendations feature in text-heavy pages, making it hard to use for planning. You can’t filter, or save your favourites, and if you site search, you then have to wade through lots and lots of article posts. The content can also be quite random – as if it’s what someone felt like writing at the time, rather than being structured.

When to use it: Once you have your main list drawn up from the other sites listed here, it’s worth a quick scan for additional tips and insights.

Website : https://www.tripsavvy.com/

This global deals site specialises in providing exclusive offers and one-of-a-kind experiences to its 30 million members worldwide (membership is free). They partner with over 5,000 travel suppliers to source cut-price inventory.

When to use it: Sign up for their newsletter, then sit back and let the deals roll in. If you’re price-conscious, or just love a deal, then use their offers to decide on where to go and what to do next. Works best if you’re flexible on dates – most deals will be for when demand is lower i.e. in winter and/or outside of school holidays.

Website : https://www.travelzoo.com

1.3 What to do when you get there: attractions

Now you’ve decided on a destination, what should you do there? What are the top attractions, the must-see-and-dos, and the ‘bucket list experiences not to be missed?

How to use it: Navigate to the destination guide webpage. Our expert writes not only curates the top travel experiences – attractions, activities, tours & events – for you, but also further splits them as either ‘bucket list’ i.e. the not-to-be-missed, or ‘other’ experiences – nice to know about, but only for if you have time/interest.

Also, be sure to scroll through the destination page photo gallery for a pictorial summary.

Google Travel

Concept: Google’s travel planning platform offers a range of tools to help users plan their trips. It includes Google Flights (see later), a hotel aggregator and holiday rentals

For deciding what to do when you go somewhere, type your destination into the search, then click on the ‘Things to do’ side icon for full listings. It tries to list in order of priority/popularity, which mostly works, though it is an auto-generated list. The written descriptions come from Wikipedia, so it lacks that human expertise and it all feels a bit soulless (to me anyway). The interface however is easy to use, and you can add favourites to a trip list.

How to use it: After you’ve been to Bucket List Travels for the curated, expert list, if you feel you need more in your itinerary, and/or you’re worried we may have missed something, then use Google Travel to check the full comprehensive listings and see if there is anything else you want to do.

Website : https://www.google.com/travel/

Lonely Planet

Concept: The original ‘guidebook’ company, they have destination guides for pretty much every place on the planet. Their expert writers, who must specialise in the destination, provide comprehensive listings and recommendations for sightseeing, accommodation and food & drink, plus very detailed logistical and practical information.

How to use it: They’re comprehensive, not curated. They include a lot of minor attractions that the majority of travellers would not want to bother with, and there’s not a lot of imagery, just text. I use them as a cross-check once I have outlined what you want to do. It’s too detailed/comprehensive for researching and planning – unless you’ve got days to spare. Handy to take the book with you, though, for the in-depth local tips when you’re there.

Honourable mentions: all of the guidebooks are broadly similar. Also try Rough Guides , Fodor’s , Frommers’ , Rick Steves (Europe only) and DK Eyewitness .

Website : https://www.lonelyplanet.com/

Tourism Associations

Concept: A local government body, tasked with promoting tourism to the destination, that will provide comprehensive information, advice and recommendations for visitors to both attract and facilitate their visit. Being the local specialist, they should know better than anyone what to see & do, and they often include many smaller, high quality attractions and tours that others will miss. However, the quality of websites is highly variable (best in the most developed, richer nations as you’d expect), and they have to be impartial so there is no curation and little opinion.

How to use it: A great resource when it’s done well. If you’re going to a developed nation, I would say they are a must-visit. Use them to start drafting up your list.

Concept: A video-sharing website where users can upload, share, and view videos on a variety of topics. It attracts billions of monthly active users. There’s a digital tonne of travel content on there, covering every aspect – from destination recommendations to videos on how to book flights.

When to use it: if you’re a visual person, YouTube is a great resource for travel inspiration. It’s jammed packed these days with ‘What to see in X’, with video and image slideshows showing you the top sights. It tends to be top sights only, but a good place to start drawing up your shortlist. It’s also great for travel advice and tips.

Website : https://youtube.com

1.4 What to do when you get there: local experiences

‘Authentic’ experiences enable you to experience the real destination, to experience its culture, to meet its people, and to live like a local. Indeed, many travellers prefer them to crowd-thronged, tourist-spoiled ‘big ticket’ attractions. Here are some resources I use to discover them in my chosen destination:

Air BnB experiences

Concept: This service allows individuals and small businesses to offer unique activities and tours to travellers in over 1,000 cities around the world. Experiences can range from food tours to pottery classes to wildlife safaris, and are designed and led by locals who have expertise in their field.

Pros: Coverage is extensive, and the experiences can be a more immersive and authentic way for travellers to connect with the local culture and community.

Cons: Some of the experiences listed I feel are more for locals than tourists, and it’s tours/classes, so not really attractions you visit like museums.

When to use it: If you’re a first-time visitor wanting to tick off the main attractions, use a site like Bucket List Travels first to find those out and make a preliminary list, then complement what they give you with these experiences to add some local flavour and insight to your itinerary.

Website : https://www.airbnb.com/experiences

Atlas Obscura

An online travel guide that features unique, offbeat and even bizarre travel experiences – be it unknown/obscure destinations or little-known experiences within well-known destinations. It also offers tours and experiences to some of the destinations featured on the website.

Pros: Once again, this is a site for those seeking off-the-beaten-track, authentic and unusual experiences.

Cons: It’s very niche, aimed at the truly intrepid traveller. If you’re a mainstream tourist, wanting to tick off the main sites, this is not the site for you.

When to use it: If you want to avoid the big tourist sites and experience something unique and different in a destination. If you’re a first-time visitor wanting to tick off the main attractions, use a site like Bucket List Travels first to find those out and make a preliminary list, then complement what they give you with the Atlas Obscura experiences to add some local flavour and insight to your itinerary.

Website : https://www.atlasobscura.com/

Spotted by Locals

Concept: A travel website/blog that provides insider city tips from locals. Each city ‘guide’ is curated by a team of handpicked city residents, featuring their favourite local spots for food, drinks, culture, and entertainment.

Pros: it’s a great source for finding those authentic local experiences, away from the tourist hoards.

Cons: Recommendations/articles are quite random in subject – and you have to scroll through pages and pages of blog posts. You can’t search or filter by interest for example. Coverage is also limited to only 80 cities.

When to use it: They also don’t cover the big-ticket attractions first-time visitors will want to see, so use this for filling gaps in your itinerary or for second visits once the big ones have been ticked off.

Website : https://www.spottedbylocals.com/

1.5 What to do when you get there: tickets & tours

Get Your Guide

Offers a very similar proposition to Viator (see below). GyG though is Europe-based, so it has much stronger tour options in Europe than the US-based Viator, which conversely has a better US inventory.

Website : https://www.getyourguide.com/

Concept: An online tour ‘aggregator’ combines and lists multi-day organised tours, both small and large group, from all the leading tour operator brands like Intrepid , G Adventures and Exodus. They are to guided tours what Booking.com is to hotels. Search is by destination, so you need to know where you want to go first.

Pros: Listings are comprehensive and up to date, giving you a window on all of the options available that you can search and filter to your specific need.

Cons: Always beware the pricing on aggregators. Operators have learned to use low pricing to get you to click through to them, then load that up with expensive extras and upgrades once you are on their site (or they lie about the price in the first place).

When to use: If you want to go on a guided tour, this is a great place to start. It will tell you who the best tour operators are, what are your tour options, and the prices.

Website : https://www.tourradar.com/

Concept: A ‘tour aggregator’ offers a wide range of tours and experiences in destinations worldwide, through local third-party tour operators. (Think of them as the Booking.com or Expedia of tours). Tours can be anything from 1-hour walking tours to 10-day organised tours. A US-based company (owned by TripAdvisor), it’s much more comprehensive in the US than in Europe.

Pros: They partner with the best local tour operators, so the tour quality is good, and you have someone to complain to if things go awry. The site search allows you to sort through the extensive catalogue quickly.

When to use it: Work out where you want to go, and get a feel for the top attractions, somewhere else, then come to Viator to book tickets and tours.

Website : https://www.viator.com/

1.6 Draft an outline itinerary

Now you know what you want to see & do in your destination, work out a rough day-by-day itinerary to ensure you get to do everything you want to do, with minimal travelling around.

Concept: see listing above.

How to use it: For most destination guides (where it makes sense to do so), our writers have set out simple itineraries of what to do and where to go on each day of a trip. For cities, they are usually 3- and 5-day itineraries (the 5-day version has the same first 3 days, then two additional days on top). They link all of the top attractions together in the most logistically convenient way, minimising travel, and including recommendations for lunch and dinner while you’re there.

Rick Steves Europe

Rick Steves is a travel guidebook author and television personality who specialises in European travel. His guidebooks offer practical advice and recommendations for budget travel, including tips on accommodations, dining, and sightseeing. His approach emphasises cultural immersion and connecting with locals, and his guides often include suggested walking tours and off-the-beaten-path destinations.

Pros: Rick’s guidebooks offer much more in-depth expertise than the others for Europe, with high-quality, well-researched recommendations based on experts with years of experience. The website has great travel forums for asking fellow travellers questions.

How to use it: It’s not a site for researching where to go and what to do. It’s better once you know where you want to go, and really want to drill into the fine detail. However, like Bucket List Travels , the site does have helpful itineraries that set out where to go and what to do day-to-day.

Website : https://www.ricksteves.com/

1.7 Specialist travel

Cruise Critic

The world’s leading online cruise review website and community provides comprehensive reviews, ratings and forums to help you assess cruise vacations. It’s the TripAdvisor of cruises (and not surprisingly, it’s owned by them), so just like with TripAdvisor, don’t believe everything you read.

When to use: We would personally recommend finding recommendations elsewhere e.g. from cruise travel journalists writing for newspapers, magazines or even Bucket List Travels. Then come to this site to check out the reviews of your shortlist.

Website : https://www.cruisecritic.co.uk/

Euan’s Guide

Set up by wheelchair user Euan MacDonald MBE, this disabled access review website is the go-to tool for many disabled people wanting to travel in the UK and beyond. It shares accessibility information for venues and the experiences/reviews of other disabled users.

Pros: Helps to solve some of the challenges disabled people face, and gives them the confidence to travel.

Cons: the coverage is mainly UK and Europe, but thankfully is widening to the rest of the world at a pace.

Website : https://www.euansguide.com

We Love 2 Ski

This excellent online resource provides skiers and snowboarders with up-to-date and comprehensive information on ski resorts, conditions, accommodation, equipment, and more. The website features detailed reviews, insider tips, and expert advice on everything related to skiing, as well as an active forum for the ski community to share their experiences and knowledge.

It’s managed by 3 ski experts, with a wealth of expertise between them and who really know their stuff and take pride in keeping the information up-to-date. It’s one of those more genuine sites that care about their advice and is not trying to constantly do the hard sell.

When to use: if you want to go skiing, start here. If you’ve already found somewhere to go or stay, be sure to check what they say about it here before you go.

Website : https://welove2ski.com/

Getting there & around

2.1 flights.

Concept: a flight deal finder service that sends you price and deal alerts on flights. You enter your preferred departure airport and they send you notifications of great deals, and price movements. Tickets are discounted 40-90%, for flights 2-6 months out in Economy, Business and First classes.

How to use it: If you’ve got flexible travel dates, or have a bucket list destination in mind. Sign up and wait for a deal.

Website : https://www.going.com/

Google’s Flights is a flight aggregator that allows you to find and compare flights. It enables you to find the airlines that fly between your destinations, and available flight times.

Prices and availability are updated in real-time, and you can sign up for price alerts. The pricing can sometimes be inaccurate, however, and when you click through, it’s usually for a basic fare without any luggage.

When to use it: Start your flight search here. You may have to add in the extras, then compare prices, or you may not get the cheapest option.

Honourable mentions: Skyscanner and Kayak offer similar services. In my experience, they pretty much have the same inventory. It really comes down to which interface you prefer.

Hopper is one of the US’s most successful travel apps, selling over $4.5B of travel each year. It helps you find the best deals on flights, hotels, home rentals, and car hire by analysing trillions of data points to predict when prices will rise or fall. When you set your dates, you see a helpful calendar showing when prices are highest and lowest, and you can sign up for price alerts.

Their second big USP is their ‘price freeze’ option, where you pay a small fee (5%-15% of the price) to freeze the price for a limited duration (options range up to 3 weeks). If the price goes up, you pay no more; if it goes down, you pay the lower price (like insurance). They also offer Flight Disruption and Cancel for Any Reason Guarantees.

Pros: Simple to use, the most accurate predictor of prices, really helps you get the best deal (if your dates are flexible). The insurance options have been a godsend to many in the recent years of travel disruption and inflating prices. Unlike other flight aggregators like Kayak or Skyscanner they show the different airline fare options within the app, so you don’t get caught by the artificially low basic fare enticing you to click through (see Skyscanner summary).

Cons: None that we can see! It really is an excellent service.

When to use it: Once you know where you want to go, come to the site to get the best deal on flights, car hire and accommodation. Simple as that.

It works best if you’re dates are flexible, so you can pick the cheapest travel dates, and/or if you have time before you book – take out the freeze option and you can be assured that the price will only come down, or sign up for the price alert.

Website : https://hopper.com/

Concept: This flight aggregator, owned by Chinese-backed Trip.com and based in Edinburgh, does the same thing as Google Flights. . It enables you to find the airlines that fly between your destinations, and available flight times.

Prices and availability are updated in real-time, and you can sign up for price alerts.

When to use it: I’ve not found much difference in pricing to Google Flights, though I much prefer Skyscanner’s user interface. It really comes down to personal choice.

Honourable mentions: US-based Kayak , originating in the US, offers a similar service to Skyscanner.

Website : https://www.skyscanner.net/

The Points Guy

If you’re someone that loves to save on travel using reward points, check out this advisory site by Brian Kelly. As he puts it, it’s ‘your go-to source for all things travel, points, miles, credit cards and more’. His advice covers both where best to earn points, and how best to spend them. There’s both a US and a UK website , with custom advice based on where you reside.

He gives up-to-date advice and tips in this ever-changing, evolving space that cuts through all of the confusion, and helps you find the best deals in the market, and explains how to take advantage of them.

How to use it: Visit here first if you’ve got points to burn, or will have and want to know the best scheme to sign up for.

Website : https://thepointsguy.com/

2.2 Car hire & taxis

Rentalcars.com

A global car rental booking platform that provides customers with access to over 60,000 rental locations in more than 160 countries worldwide. The site enables you to compare prices and features from a wide range of rental companies. Customers can also benefit from 24/7 support and free cancellation on most bookings.

I’ve regularly rented cars via them, and never found a cheaper deal. The customer service and support are also very good. There’s not really a reason to start looking anywhere else.

Website : https://www.rentalcars.com/

It doesn’t really need any introduction… but just for completeness. Founded in 2009, Uber is a ride-hailing service that connects riders with drivers in most major cities around the world. Through the app, you can request and pay for rides, track your driver’s location, and rate the experience.

Uber’s meteoric rise to a global brand can be attributed to solving several customer issues with then-taxi firms: they would find you a ride tell you how long it would take to arrive, how much the fare would be upfront, and sort payment automatically through your account, thus avoiding the need to have enough cash on you.

Other leading ride-sharing apps include Lyft (US and Canada) and Cabify (Spain & Latin America).

2.3 Rail, Bus & Ferry

Concept: Omio is a comprehensive travel search and booking platform that helps users find and book the best deals on trains, buses, and flights across Europe. The website offers a user-friendly interface, with real-time price comparisons and flexible search options to suit individual needs and preferences.

When to use: It’s a great tool for planning and booking multi-modal trips.

Website : https://www.omio.co.uk/

Rail Europe

Concept: Rail Europe is a one-stop-shop for planning and booking train travel in 33 European countries. The website offers a wide range of tickets, passes, and packages for different destinations and budgets, as well as information on train schedules, routes, and stations. Note, they don’t cover local trams and metros, it’s intercity trains only (that includes Eurostar). Enter the destinations you want to go to and they’ll recommend the best value ticket/pass.

For multiple trips, you’ll likely be recommended a Eurail pass. This brilliant invention allows you to travel on over 30 European railway operators and some ferries too. Kids under 11 travel free with an adult.

Website : https://www.raileurope.com/

2.4 Route planning

Google Maps

Who hasn’t used google Maps? And for good reason. Its coverage is comprehensive, it’s simple to use, and it’s is invaluable when you’re trying to figure out how to get from A to B in an unfamiliar place. It shows travel times and distances in multiple transport modes: on foot, bike, by available public transport and by car.

How to use it: use it to help plan upfront your transportation from point to point in your itinerary.

Website : https://www.google.com/maps

Hands down the best service for planning and booking journeys within and between countries. It combines and compares transport options from over 5,000 transportation providers across 160 countries, then recommends the cheapest, fastest, and most convenient routes for different modes of transportation including flights, trains, buses, and car rentals. The website also provides comprehensive travel information. It will quote prices, distances, times, mileage, route numbers, and which companies to book.

Their slogan is “Discover how to get anywhere by plane, train, bus, ferry & car – and it does exactly what is says on the tin.

Website : https://www.rome2rio.com/

Where to stay

3.1 'best' hotels - curated selections.

Whatever you go, there are always thousands of hotel options. These sites do the research work for you and use experts to curate a list of the best, based on location, quality and quality.

How to use it: For all the destinations we cover, we provide you with a curated list of the best hotels – for all budgets, from the mainstream to the unusual.

The selections are made by our writers, who must not only be leading travel journalists, but also specialise in that destination (either living there or visiting frequently). The writers have at least inspected and usually stayed in the properties they recommend.

Conde Nast Traveller

Similar to Travel & Leisure above, this high-end, luxury global travel magazine covers a range of topics including hotels and resorts, airlines, cruises, food and drink, and various travel destinations around the world.

When to use it: They do great round-ups of the ‘best’ hotels to stay in a destination – but obviously at the top end. If you’re not that price sensitive, start with their shortlist.

Honourable mention: Travel & Leisure, their great rival, also does destination hotel round-ups.

Website : https://www.cntraveller.com/

In my view, it’s the best ‘guidebook’ website for researching and planning a trip online – once you know where you want to go. They simply and helpfully list out a reasonably long short list of things to see & do and places to stay, and rate them each from 1-3, depending on how good they are.

However, like all the guidebooks online, coverage is comprehensive at times, requiring a lot of time and effort to research through it. The website is also swamped with banner ads that are off-putting and annoying.

How to use it: A good place to start your hotel search. They generally do select good options, though it’s more aimed at budget travellers.

Website : https://www.frommers.com/

The Telegraph (Travel)

This long-standing British newspaper does a fine job of curating and rating (out of 10) the best hotels in destinations around the world, for all budgets. The reviews tell you what you want to know – style, location, key amenities – without being overwhelming.

As for Bucket List Travels , selections and reviews are written by top travel writers who have inspected and usually stayed in the property. The number of hotels they recommend is a lot more than Bucket List Travels – and includes ones we certainly wouldn’t include – but it does give you a longer list to start with.

When to use it: if you care about where you stay, and really want one of the best places, this is a great place to start your start for somewhere to stay.

Website : https://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/

TripAdvisor

The original hotel review site, it has since expanded to become the global platform for reviews (and information) on hotels, restaurants, attractions, and other travel-related businesses. It also offers a variety of travel-related content and resources, including travel guides and forums.

Over the years it has, sadly become increasingly corrupted with fake reviews, but they can’t fake all of them and as long as there are at least several hundred reviews, the score should be reasonably reflective.

When to use it: I personally like to start drawing up a shortlist of places to stay on other sites listed here, then do a quick check of the reviews of each on TripAdvisor. I also filter to see only the negative comments, then look at 1) how recent they are 2) if it is a one-off complaint i.e. someone had a refund request refused and 3) if it is something that can and probably has been fixed e.g. a rude receptionist. Small room sizes, traffic noise from road proximity, and so on – these issues are not easily fixed.

Website : https://www.tripadvisor.com

3.2 Boutique hotel collections

If it’s a boutique hotel you’re after, try one of these specialist sites. They only list high-quality properties that meet their individual criteria.

Design Hotels

As the name suggests, this website offers a curated selection of over 300 independently owned and operated hotels and resorts around the world, each chosen for its unique design and aesthetic. The site emphasizes design and architecture and offers a range of luxury and boutique properties.

Pros: It’s a brilliant resource for finding unique and interesting stays, especially with modern and/or minimalist interiors.

Cons: if you’re not that worried about hotel design, then it doesn’t offer a lot of value other than a list of interesting hotels.

When to use: if you’re interested in design, and prioritise that in your accommodation, then this is a great resource. If it’s not that important, you’re better off elsewhere with a greater selection and better prices.

Website : https://www.designhotels.com/

This boutique hotel booking website offers a carefully curated selection of stylish, unique and independently-run hotels and vacation rentals around the world. They offer in-depth reviews of each property, personalised recommendations, and a friendly, 24/7 booking service.

Pros: The curated selection of unique and stylish properties is exceptional and of a consistently high quality that you can rely on. Each property has been personally inspected by staff. The reviews, from both customers and staff, are honest and in-depth and tell you who it is and isn’t for, rather than pretend everyone’s going to love it.

Cons: There’s a limited number of properties in many destinations, and it is property, not destination, led – meaning is easier to find the place, then decide on the destination rather than the reverse (which may suit).

When to use: if their style of property i.e. unique, high quality, small and independent, is what you like/are looking for, there’s no better resource to use. If they don’t have something in your preferred destination, then look elsewhere, but check first.

Honourable mention: Sawdays offers a similar service, but they’re UK & Europe only.

Website : https://www.i-escape.com/

Mr & Mrs Smith

This first-rate, UK-based hotel booking website curates handpicked, boutique hotels around the world, each personally inspected to meet their high standards of facilities, service and location. The website has in-depth reviews of each property, with insider tips like what are the best rooms to book, without being overwhelming.

There are also exclusive benefits for members like gifts on arrival, or late checkouts, and a 24/7 booking service.

Pros: The standard of hotels is consistently high, so much so that the brand has become a trusted stamp of quality. The booking service and post-sales support is efficient yet very personable, and hotel staff genuinely care about ‘Smith’ customers so you feel very welcome when you arrive.

Cons: They have limited or no options in many destinations. They also can’t match the benefits of the OTA reward schemes like Booking.com .

When to use: The site is great if this is your style of hotel, and you want to be looked after at every step. Limited coverage is only an issue if you are dead set on a destination. If you’re not really that bothered where you go, or at least are open to suggestions, check this excellent site first.

Website : https://www.mrandmrssmith.com/

Secret Escapes

A members-only hotel booking website that offers exclusive deals and discounts on luxury hotels and vacations around the world. The site negotiates special rates with hotels and resorts, available to their members only.

Pros: There some great deals and genuine exclusive discounts to be had, though max discount tends to be 30% (and average of 15%-20%), but still not to be sniffed at. They also do a good job of curation, so you know you’re getting a decent hotel.

Cons: You still need to compare prices to other sites like Booking.com and the hotel’s own website, as there are lots of sneaky tricks and breaking of agreements that going on behind the scenes and you never really know where the best deal is until you check.

When to use: if you know where you want to go, it’s well worth checking in for a deal.

Website : https://www.secretescapes.com/

Small Luxury Hotels of the World

This website has personally visited, verified and vetted every single one of its 520 hotels in more than 90 countries. The criteria for inclusions I small (<50 rooms, non-chain and offering the highest standards of luxury and service.

Pros: it’s an exceptional collection of outstanding hotels, and the brand guarantees a high-quality, luxury stay. Members get 10% off and extra (tiered) benefits like upgrades and late checkouts. Hotels welcome their members with open arms, as they usually spend well, and SMH look after their customers.

Cons: things this good come with a price tag. Many hotels are out of reach of most travellers’ budgets.

When to use: if you’re a discerning, occasionally demanding, traveller, that specifically wants a smaller hotel, this is a great place to start your search. Check other websites though for better prices – even with the 10% off – but if you’re not that price sensitive, it’s nice to book with someone who cares, as opposed to a hotel production line like Booking.com.

Website : https://slh.com/

Tablet Hotels

This New York-based brand, founded in 2000 and well-known across the US, has curated over 3,500 boutique & luxury properties around the world. In 2018, it was purchased by and merged with Michelin.

Similar to Mr & Mrs Smith, they curate a selection based on criteria, offer a full booking service, and exclusive benefits for ‘Tablet Plus’ members like VIP upgrades and free valet parking.

Pros: the curated selection guarantees a measure of quality, and some of the VIP benefits are really nice ones to have and make you feel a bit special.

Cons: You inevitably will pay more than on other sites, and sometimes they overpromise and underdeliver on the VIP experience – much depends on the attitude of the hotel. The criteria for selection is much broader than a Mr & Mrs Smith, so you’re not getting that real consistency of accommodation, and the personal relationship that Smith has with its properties.

When to use: If you want to feel like a VIP and value those benefits over saving a few pennies or cents, then they are worth a look.

Website : https://www.tablethotels.com/

3.3 Home rentals & stays

Launched in 2008 and needing no introduction, this global accommodation powerhouse forever altered the holiday market. Now with more than 300,000 listings in over 190 countries, it has expanded from its original core offering of ‘spare rooms to rent’ to include apartments, treehouses, villas – whatever you can stay in, it’s likely to be on AirBnB.

Pros: the sheer number of options and global coverage means you’re highly likely to find something you want. The site is simple and easy to use, with lots of photographs, user reviews and star ratings.

Cons: The product and website is great, but they don’t really care about customers, and customer service if something goes wrong can be challenging to find.

When to use: whenever you’re looking for something other than a hotel, and/or something more authentic or with a local feel. It’s especially good for families and groups wanting to stay together in one place.

Website : https://www.airbnb.com

Couchsurfing

This global hospitality exchange enables you to stay with a host for free for a few nights – be it sofa or, if you’re lucky, a bed. You simply create a profile, search for hosts, and request to stay with them. Surprisingly, perhaps, it works, and over the years the site has built a loyal following and a strong community of ‘couchsurfers’ who help and support each other, and even organise events around the world.

When to use it: When budget is tight and you just really want somewhere to crash, and/or you’re looking to connect with other travellers and the local community.

Website : https://www.couchsurfing.com/

This upscale holiday home and apartment rental specialist has a large catalogue of privately-owned places to stay, which you can filter by key criteria like price, location, number of bedrooms etc. Each listing is vetted by their team to ensure it meet minimum standards. It’s owned by the Expedia Group.

The quality of homes for rent is exceptional and varied, from lake houses to treehouses, and the search and filtering makes it quick and simple to find something that suits. Customer service is good, much better than AirBnB for example.

Website : https://www.vrbo.com/

Villas of Distinction

Villas of Distinction is a luxury villa rental company that offers an extensive portfolio of properties in over 50 destinations worldwide. They provide personalized service to help clients select the perfect villa for their vacation, and offer a range of amenities such as private pools, chefs, and concierge services to enhance the guest experience.

When to use it: When you’re looking for an independent, self-catering stay in an uber-luxurious villa. It’s top-end, with a price tag to match.

Honourable mention: One Fine Stay offers a similar service.

Website : https://www.villasofdistinction.com/

3.4 Campsites & Hostels

HostelWorld

The hostel specialist is the go-to place for booking budget accommodation in over 170 countries – both dormitory beds and private rooms. The website and mobile app allow you to browse and book from a wide range of hostels, hotels, and guesthouses, with a focus on affordable and social options. There are also offers travel guides, reviews, and a loyalty program for frequent users.

Pros: The UX is really smooth, the inventory (number of options) is much is larger than on the major hotel search engines (OTAs), and it does a much better job of setting out dormitory bed pricing and deal options. There are a number of ‘community’ features that encourage you to connect with fellow travellers.

When to use it: If you’re on a budget or want to meet people when you’re travelling, start here with your accommodation search.

Website : https://www.hostelworld.com/

If you’re looking for something off-grid, preferably unique and unusual – but don’t want to compromise too much on luxury, this website is for you. It’s a directory of for luxury campsites and stays, with various accommodation options ranging from tents to tipis, log cabins to vintage caravans. Coverage is mainly Europe & UK, though they have plans to expand beyond.

Website : https://campaglam.com/

3.5 Price comparison

Concept: This Expedia-owned hotel search engine allows you to compare prices from various booking sites for over 1.8 million hotels in more than 190 countries. You can search & filter to discover hotels matching your criteria, then each hotel listing shows the price of a room on the various OTA sites. The site also offers user reviews, ratings, and filters to help you decide.

For all aggregators, the prices are often inaccurate, and not the cheapest option when you click through. The OTAs (like Expedia, Booking.com) have learned over the years how to manipulate them to ensure their listing comes up first with the cheapest price.

When to use it: It’s a good place to start your hotel search, especially when you have specific requirements such that you can use the on-site filters to narrow down the options quickly. If you discover a hotel you want somewhere else, always come and check the prices here before booking.

Note – it doesn’t always include the hotel direct price (so make sure you check separately), and sometimes the prices are inaccurate when you click through.

Honourable mentions: HotelsCombined , owned by Booking.com and the main rival to Trivago, is known for having better deals as they search lesser-known booking sites (though that can come with risks). Both I suspect of bias, however, in pushing Booking.com and Expedia products. Skyscanner also now offers accommodation price comparison, and they have the advantage of being independent and unbiased of the leading OTAs. Kayak also offers price comparison – but they are owned by Booking.com too. I prefer Trvago above the rest purely because they also helpfully show you show the lowest price depending on the ‘deal’ type i.e. cancellable or non, including breakfast etc. which obviously makes a big difference to the ‘cheapest’ price.

Website : https://www.trivago.com

3.6 Accommodation booking

Booking.com

The world’s largest accommodation online booking service that lists over 28 million hotels (and now rentals, B&Bs and hostels) from around the world. They offer a tiered loyalty program called ‘Genius’ The three levels offer 10%, 15%, and 20% discounts (respectively) on bookings at hundreds of thousands of participating locations. They also include priority customer service help, and free breakfast packages or room upgrades when possible.

Pros: The website is easy to use, with excellent filter options, and once you have created an account, you can book within a few clicks. Their inventory is phenomenal, with most hotels in the world signed up. The loyalty program is accessible and with great benefits.

Cons: The loyalty program only applies for a limited number of participating hotels, so you won’t always get the benefits. Hotel websites often still have a better deal, and some don’t release all of their room types to Booking.com so you can’t see these rooms.

Booking.com may also confusingly say ‘sold out’ when there are rooms available still on the hotel website. So always check the hotel website before booking.

When to use it: Start your accommodation search here, and then once you’ve narrowed down the options with the filters, check other sites and the hotel website for a better deal.

Honourable mention: Agoda is essentially a carbon copy of Booking.com – they are owned by the Bookings Holdings Group. Agoda has it’s roots in Asia, and is based in Singapore, so it has more comprehensive Asian content. If that’s where you’re going, it’s worth using.

Website : https://www.booking.com

Concept: same as for Booking.com, with a similar tiered loyalty program, though at time of writing, the tiered benefits are not lifetime like they are with Booking.com. You need to be a regular customer to benefit from the higher tiers – not the case with Booking.com.

Their famous loyalty program of stay 10 times, earn one free reward night – now the basic tier – requires you to book at least once every 12 months or your reward night expires.

Honourable mention: Expedia is essentially a carbon copy of Hotels.com. They’re owned by the same group, and effectively have the same hotel inventory and pricing. There are slight differences in the reward program – I think Hotels.com’s one is better, hence why they got the nudge.

Website : https://hotels.com

HotelTonight

Owned by AirBnB , this mobile app and website offers last-minute hotel rooms at discounted rates. Inventory ranges from budget to luxury, and you can use the filters to specify your location and preferences. There’s also a ‘Rate Drop’ feature that discounts same-day prices after 3pm.

When to use: if you need a last-minute room, it’s definitely worth checking for a deal. However, in my experience, their deals weren’t especially good compared to other standard booking sites – though the ‘Rate Drop’ does deliver discounts.

Website : https://www.hoteltonight.com/

Food, drink & entertainment

4.1 food & drink.

A food and dining news website that provides reviews, guides, and information on restaurants and food trends in various cities across the world. The site offers articles on topics such as dining culture, chefs, industry news, and more. They also feature videos and podcasts related to food and restaurants. The quality of content and recommendations is excellent, and they’ve regularly won awards to their food & wine journalism.

When to use it: Officially it only spans 23 US cities, and if that’s where you’re headed, it’s a good place to check. However, that’s for detailed coverage. For most cities, however, they have a round-up of ‘the best restaurants in X’, covering all price ranges. Just search for it on their site.

Website : https://eater.com

Foodie blogs

Local foodies blog about anything from food trucks to Michelin-starred restaurants. In any destination, especially cities, the food scene changes so fast that almost any corporate website will not keep up. Local foodies are out testing daily, and take pride in keeping their blogs up to date with the latest and greatest. They also cover the smaller, more niche places that only a local would know about.

There are too many to mention, but search for ‘food blogs in X’ by Googling (or Binging) and see who you can find.

When to use: When you want to discover some insider foodie experiences in a destination, and get some good restaurant tips that are not Michelin-starred.

Concept: Increasingly the go-to resource for vegan and vegetarian dining around the world, run by vegans, as the popularity of the movement continues to gather a welcome pace and momentum. The site is also becoming a thriving community hub, with active forums and listings of fellow vegans in local cities that you can message for tips.

When to use it: to discover the best vegan and vegetarian dining options in your destination, or to get tips/advice from the local community.

Website : https://www.happycow.net/

This stalwart former magazine is still the place to go in the digital era for local listings of ‘what’s on’. It provides comprehensive listings, information and reviews on cultural events, concerts, theatre performances, film screenings, and other entertainment in cities around the world.

When to use it: If you’re wanting to book in some entertainment on your trip, this is the best place to start looking.

Website : https://www.timeout.com/

Yelp is a platform that allows you to search for and review local businesses, including restaurants, bars, shops, and other services in 220 cities in 32 countries . It’s best known for restaurant reviews, however – some of the other business listings can be fairly light. As with all review sites, it suffers from fake reviews,  but the volume is sufficient to give you an overall sense of what’s worth a try.

How to use it: I use it to draft a short list of places to try, then cross-check that with other sources and/or my hotel if I’m staying in one. Concierges will give good restaurant tips, but in my experience, the options they give are limited.

Website : https://www.yelp.com

Before you go

Centre for Disease Control

The Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is a national public health institute in the United States. The website provides comprehensive information and resources on health and safety topics, including infectious diseases, vaccines, travel health, environmental health, emergency preparedness, and more.

When to use it: before you go to a new destination, stop here to check any disease risks and vaccination requirements (you can search by country from the home page). It also has helpful advice for people with special health conditions , and/or doing specialist activities.

Website : https://www.cdc.gov/

5.2 What to take

This global online store is a specialist in all things travel accessories, with over 200 products covering everything from adapters, to travel pillows and luggage security.

How to use it: have a skim before you go. I always end up seeing/buying things I never even knew I needed!

Website : https://go.travel

Packing List Checklist App

A handy app to create packing checklists – a godsend for people like me who always forget their sunglasses. A plethora of packing list apps, I like and use this one before it’s simple, quick – and free. No upgrades needed.

You manually create your own list(s) – you can create multiple different ones, for different holiday types for example – then select from a list of a fairly comprehensive list of suggested items to start you off. Most of the time that will do it, though you can add your own if needed. When it comes to packing, you can tick things off as and when they’re in the case.

How to use it: Next time you get a few free moments, create a packing list. Add to it as and when things pop into your head. Tick them off when you pack.

Website : https://apps.apple.com/gb/app/packing-list-checklist/id1235121075

5.3 Travel planning

TripIt is another travel organising app that allows you to store all of your travel plans in one place. Users can forward their confirmation emails for flights, hotels, and rental cars to the app, which will then create a master itinerary for their trip. The app also provides real-time flight alerts, directions, and travel recommendations.

Website : https://www.tripit.com/web

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The 50 Best Travel Websites and Travel Resources 2024

March 28, 2024

Here’s my collection of the top 50 travel websites and travel resources for all stages of dreaming, planning, booking and remembering your trip based on decades of professional travel. 

The Best Travel Resources for Booking and Planning Your Trip 2024

As a regular contributor to  The Independent’s 50 Best Travel Websites feature , I know my way around travel websites. As a frequent traveller myself, I practically live on the things.

From dreaming about a trip, planning a trip, writing up a trip and reviewing trips for work, these are the travel resources, online booking sites, search engines and route planners I use to help me get the job done. Booking travel without travel agents has never been easier – even if it doesn’t feel like it at times.

So here’s my list of the best travel websites for 2024. It’s the best time to uncover the best places.

If you book or buy through the links on this page, we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. However, we only ever recommend things we believe in and use ourselves. We also don’t earn a commission from all of these travel websites. Alas ;-)

The Best Hotel Booking Sites for Special Occasions

To find the best hotels needs a little bit of legwork. If you’re looking for somewhere beautiful to stay with a real travel experience, then try these sites first. If you’re looking for something more practical, jump on down to the next section.

Here are the top travel websites when it comes to boutique hotels:

Design Hotels

Beautiful, stylish and with up to 40% off for members, the chic and sleek Design Hotels website is a firm favourite of mine. Membership is free, quick and easy on the eye.

Best Loved Hotels

Best Loved Hotels gathers together properties from the UK and Ireland that show a real passion for what they do. From countryside manors to city break boltholes, I’ve stayed in several of their properties and have loved each one.

Mr & Mrs Smith

You may be forgiven for thinking this gorgeous collection was all about romance, but beyond finding great places for anniversaries and honeymoons, Mr & Mrs Smith cover great child friendly places too. Not just a website for inspiration, you can book directly on the site.

Small Luxury Hotels

The name says it all. Small Luxury Hotels   collect together independently minded hotels on their website and promise – and deliver – an authentic travel experience.

Leading Hotels of the World

Another website that wears its heart on its sleeve, Leading Hotels of the World gather together more than 375 luxury properties (including resorts) around the world.

MyBoutiqueHotel.com

With a great eye for design, MyBoutiqueHotel.com , as the name suggests, sources boutique hotels from around the world available for direct booking. Properties are combined into an easy on the eye collection, with curated lists for main cities plus the ability to create your own shortlists as you narrow down your choice. Membership is free and the themed lists save hours of research. You’ll find budget and luxury boutique hotel choices and can drill down to those suitable for work, for the kids, for romantic getaways and more.

The Best Hotel Booking Sites for the Best Deals and Specifics

These are the best travel websites for 2024 for booking flight and hotel packages together or for searching for accommodation when you have very specific needs. These online travel agencies let you trawl through thousands of places to stay in the blink of an eye. Plus, several offer exceptional hotel deals for your next adventure.

cozycozy.com

Describing itself as a search engine for accommodation, CozyCozy.com is an exciting newcomer on the hotel booking block. It rounds up offers from hotels, rentals, hostels, treehouses and boats into one easy to use platform. You’ll find the giants, like Booking.com and AirBnB and VRBO, as well as smaller accommodation solutions too. By searching with Cozycozy.com, you can save yourself a lot of time. They won’t cover everything. But they come pretty close.

A few more things to note. They guarantee that the price you see is the price you pay. They have a range of filters that go further than the rest (think searching for a hairdryer or washing machine.) And, my favourite. They have an “unusual” tab that opens up possibilities you may never have known existed. Yurt for one anyone?

Lastminute.com

I’ve grown old with Lastminute.com , originally because I fell in love with the name. But over the years, I still find them useful for last minute city break or resort based holidays (vacation packages if you’re from the US.) They’re an online travel agency with easy to navigate interface and lots of last-minute deals!

Expedia is SO big and all-encompassing that it’s sometimes easy to get lost within the website. But that’s also its strength for when your travel plans don’t fit into the travel sites I’ve mentioned above.

TripAdvisor

The great green travel website can really give you an inside look at a hotel. Yes, some of the reviews are fake but even the bad reviews can be helpful. One person’s “bad review” because there was no nightlife is another’s blissful discovery if they want a quiet, relaxing stay.

Plus, you get the benefit of booking through a trusted source with backup. AND the TripAdvisor community is really helpful if you have specific niggly questions about tourist destinations or are looking for great ideas.

Booking.com

Booking.com offers more search filters for hotels than anything else I’ve come across in the travel industry. When the specifics really matter (rather than the sense of atmosphere or design) then I turn to Booking.com It’s a powerful hotel search engine, with guest houses and self-catering options as well.

Top tips for finding the best travel deals

• Look for off peak options whenever you can.
• Don’t just stick to the big booking websites. Check out the smaller, unique travel websites as well.
• Consider flying from regional airports.
• Have a system! Our handy Travel Toolbox © will help with this.

Finding Great Flight Deals

There is, quite simply, an art to finding a good flight. Not just in terms of cost but also in terms of comfort and connection. It really is a useful life skill to be able to skip the travel agent and find what you want yourself.

With that in mind, check out our guide to the  best flight booking hacks for savvy travellers here.  

Then, get acquainted with the following flight search engines, for both domestic and international flights.

Skyscanner is the travel agent boyfriend or girlfriend with special deals you never had. Skyscanner listens, remembers your birthday, cleans your windscreen and empties the bin even when it isn’t its turn.

Well, OK, it doesn’t do any of that but  it DOES make it very, very easy to look for flights. Instead of forcing you to enter the same details in, or tie you to a date, Skyscanner uses filters and choices that simplify the flight-finding process. You can also search by price and switch currencies between dollars, euros, sterling and more. For both domestic and international travel.

If you have any flexibility in your planning, Skyscanner can let you search through the whole month for the best fare, slide filters for time of day, number of connections, just about anything. The only weak spot is searching for flights with infants, where the system is a little glitchy. Other than that, it’s one of the best airfare sites.

Don’t be put off by the watery name. Kayak is a meta search engine that crawls the web for flights and lets you sift through the results with ease. If you’re committed to finding the cheapest flights, then make sure you check everywhere you can.

Google Flights

Fellow travel professionals swear by Google Flights, although it’s never quite become one of my favourites. The strength of using Google’s software is that it responds quickly to real time changes. Perfect if your flight has just been cancelled because of weather or some other external event and you need to find your way home quickly.

You can even use Siri. “Hey google, give me search results for flights to New York!”

Travel experiences await.

The Best Travel Websites for Driving Holidays

You’re in road trip heaven here. We love road trips and have everything for them. Check out these great resources for planning a road trip.

Your Road Trip Toolkit

• The road trip essentials you need to know about
• The Ultimate Road Trip Planner  with printables and handbook
• 101 fun road trip questions for your next drive
• I nspiring road trip quotes for your instagram caption ideas.

AA Route Planner

This is another travel website that I love for its simplicity. Want to know how to get from A to B? Enter it in the AA Route Planner. It shows you a map and clear journey times in a split second. You can just leave it at that or add in stop off points and adjust for traffic and so on. The only problem is that it only covers driving in Europe.

MapQuest offers fantastic coverage of the United States and is free and easy to use to help plot our road trips.

Google Maps

Google Maps , on the other hand, cover the world. But it’s slightly more fiddly to use. It’s a lifesaver while actually on the road but it’s also useful in planning.

You can save destinations, plot itineraries and tweak public maps for your own trips. And – did you know that you can download maps and directions offline? Indeed, you can. It’s not only an online travel site.

Car Rental Travel Resources

I’ve driven cars all around the world and used all kinds of car rental companies and rental cars. Sometimes needs must but these days, wherever possible, I book through a reputable, international company. Then I look for car rental deals.

Hertz is one of my favourites. It’s so widespread and well-organised. Plus, as an inside tip, if you sign up to their Gold members programme (for free) you can quickly get lots of benefits.

However, for more of a search comparison site, I use Holiday Autos and then open RentalCars.Com in a new tab.

• Don’t forget to download your free copy of our car rental checklist here.

Healthy Tray of Treats Room Service at One Aldwych, Covent Garden

The Best Travel Resources for Health

Centers for disease control and prevention.

Clearly, you should consult your own doctor before you travel. But, the CDC Travel Website is the one my medical friends recommend. So, don’t rely on it entirely. You do need an appointment with a real person. But it’s helpful to get an idea of what vaccinations and medication you are likely to need for certain countries before you decide to book. This applies all the more if your situation has changed due to a recent illness or pregnancy.

The Best Travel Websites for Saving Money

Money saving expert.

Martin Lewis’ Money Saving Expert website firmly focuses its attention on a UK audience. It provides regularly updated and researched guides on essentials from currency exchange to travel insurance and finding cheap flights.

They also crunch the numbers with credit cards, publishing spreadsheets and tables to help you navigate the world of credit card rewards and the best way to save money.

Travel Insurance

I’d always recommend checking out the guide above before you book. But one of my favourite places to go for travel insurance is Heymondo.

Roaming Costs: Airalo

Unless you have roaming fees included in your usual phone package, remember to switch off mobile data when you travel.

Instead, embrace the brilliance of an eSIM. That means, you switch SIM cards without having to physically pop the plastic cover out of your phone using the back of an earring, hoping you don’t lose it before you head home again.

I’ve tested Airalo all across the world, including North America, Europe and the Middle East. It’s fantastic. So quick. So much money saved.

Train Travel Resources

Db rail planner for train travel in europe.

I love the DB site. It covers almost all of Europe and has an English version online travel website that is so easy to use.

National Rail Journey Planner

National Rail itself may be long gone but as a travel website, the National Rail Journey Planner is the best I’ve found to negotiate the different rail networks of the UK.

Eurail (Formerly InterRail)

Forget the sweaty backpacker image. The Eurail network includes First Class rail travel through glossy transport hubs. You can buy a range of rail passes or simply use their maps, itineraries and suggestions to help you plan your rail trip through Europe.

Heathrow Express

This remains the fastest way to reach the city centre of London from London’s Heathrow Airport, as well as Paddington Station, the gateway to the west, southwest and Wales. Using the Heathrow Express website in advance, you can book tickets for as little as  £5.50. Plus, children 15 and under travel for free.

The Elizabeth Line in London

A sneaky little bit of inside info. To save money on the Heathrow Express, take the slightly slower “normal” train from Paddington to Heathrow instead. Costs a fraction of the price and is generally more comfortable.

If you’re looking to travel through Japan, then you can’t miss their high speed shinkansen trains. They’re part of what Japan is famous for. Buy your Japan Rail pass before you go to get the best deals as a tourist.

The Best Travel Websites for Honeymoons and Anniversaries

While you can build your own honeymoon through the travel resources above, niche travel website 101 Honeymoons takes the hard work out of the equation for you. It filters honeymoons by month, interest and family situation, with trusted input from some of the top travel writers in the trade.

My Favourite Cruise Travel Resources

Everyone has different tastes. I prefer smaller cruises with plenty of cultural and adventurous options and excursions. Look for cruise lines which aim to introduce people to the destination and respect local customs rather than just keep people on the ship.

I would highly recommend Avalon Waterways for cruises in Europe and beyond and Uncruise Adventures for small ship cruising in Alaska.

In 2022, I took my first giant cruise with Princess Cruises – and you can read what that was like here.

The Best Tour Companies

It took me years to believe it but sometimes joining a tour, just for half a day, is a great way of connecting with locals and learning new skills.

These days, it’s easier than ever to find just the tour you need as one of the latest trends has become a permanent fixture. In popular destinations, it’s also useful to use these sites to skip the queues and buy your tickets in advance.

You can search for recommendations on travel blogs (ahem) or head straight to the big search sites.

I’ve tested both of these across the world and would highly recommend them:

• Get Your Guide has great cancellation policies and an easy booking process.
• Viator has a huge collection of local guides, transfers from the airport, cooking classes and more.

The Best UK Travel Websites

Self catered cottages.

For ease of use, the app that comes with Sykes Cottages makes it easy to plan a trip away in snippets of down time in a busy life. Quality Cottages sweeps some gorgeous luxury cottages into view in Wales.

Glampingly remains my favourite site for finding quirky yet comfortable glamping spots in Europe. Want to know why? Check out this collection of the best treehouse holidays in the UK.

With a mix of glamping and alternative places to sleep, C anopy and Stars fills in the gaps.

A special, self-catered foodie twist

To add a sense of luxe to your self-catered holiday, order in a gourmet meal from One Fine Dine. This private jet catering company now packages up incredible meals with full instructions on how to finish them off and plate them up. Adds a lovely sense of occasion to a self-catered trip away.

In Conclusion

And one last note. Are you American and wondering why I’m not talking about dream vacation packages? I am, we just call them holidays in the UK. And car rentals are hire cars. And travel guides are, well, travel guides. I guess some things stay the same after all ;-)

Did you enjoy this collection of the best travel websites and travel resources for 2024? Bookmark this list of travel websites on Pinterest for later.

For more travel tips, check out our travel resources on how to plan your next trip here.

Our Favourite Travel Resources for 2024

• Download your FREE pre-trip checklist
• Download your copy of the Ultimate Travel Packing Checklist

Some of the best travel resources can be those you create yourself. Here are some creative travel journal ideas to get you started. Future you will be grateful!

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Best Online Travel Agencies

Booking.com is our top choice for making your trip arrangements

Ligaya Malones is an editor, blogger, and freelance writer specializing in food and travel. Ligaya's work has appeared in publications including Lonely Planet and BRIDES.

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Planning a trip can be easier through an online travel agency than if you handle each aspect of the planning separately. You can book hotels, air travel, rental cars, and more through a single site, and booking everything together sometimes results in discounts. By inputting a destination, a range of dates, and other preferences, you will see a list of options for each aspect of travel.

The best online travel agencies offer options from the largest number of airlines, hotels, car rental agencies, and more. Look for sites that offer discounts for combining reservations for different aspects of your trip. For example, the best sites will have lower rates if you book both plane tickets and a hotel through their services. The best sites also provide reviews from customers who actually have booked through the service. These are our top picks.

• Best Overall: Booking.com
• Best Budget: Skyscanner
• Best Price Predictor: Hopper
• Most Innovative: Kiwi.com
• Best for Eco-Conscious: Kind Traveler
• Best for Social Impact: I Like Local
• Best for Design-Forward Homestays: Plum Guide
• Our Top Picks
• Booking.com

Kind Traveler

I Like Local

• See More (4)

Final Verdict

Frequently asked questions, methodology, best overall : booking.com.

 Booking.com

This industry leader offers one of the most comprehensive trip planning platforms on the Internet.

Lots of options to choose from

Interface is easy to use

Numerous filters to customize your search

Tricky to tell whether changes/cancellations can be made with Booking.com or the vendor directly

Booking.com was founded in 1996 and has grown into an industry leader that stands out for being one of the most comprehensive trip planning platforms out there. From one website, you can compare and book accommodations, flights (including one-way and multi-city flights), sightseeing activities, and even airport taxis. The website lists more than 28 million accommodation options, from hotels, hostels, and B&Bs to vacation homes and luxury resorts—you can browse more choices per destination on Booking.com than other online travel agencies. The website also performs well on cost and typically returns lower-than-average prices for flights and hotels. 

Booking.com's interface is also easy to use. On the home page, search for a hotel by entering your chosen destination and dates. Then, use the extensive list of filters—such as price range and distance from the city center—to narrow the results down and find the best fit. You can also search for a specific hotel, or seek inspiration by clicking through options grouped by destination or property type or by topic such as the country’s best Michelin-starred hotel restaurants or the top cities for vegan travelers. The flights, car rental, and other tabs are just as intuitive. 

Best Budget : Skyscanner

 Skyscanner

You can compare prices across airlines, hotels, and car rentals.

Simple interface

Option to toggle searches between specific dates or by monthly calendars

Search Everywhere button is great for spontaneous planners

Extra clicks are required to make a final purchase

Must read fine print for changes/cancellations—may need to deal directly with the vendor

Ads on the sidebar can be distracting

Find deals on airfare, hotels, and car rentals with an aggregator site like Skyscanner , which uses a metasearch engine to compare prices from all online travel agencies and the airline, hotel, or car rental company in question. Run searches with fixed dates, opt to compare airfare prices month to month, or click “Cheapest Month.” Searches also include options for nearby airports or non-stop flights only. With hotel searches, you can choose to select only from properties with free cancellation, a cleanliness rating of 4.5/5 or higher, or 3- or 4-starred hotels only. Car rental searches include an option to select “return car to different location.”

Once you’ve found the best rate, click on the link to be redirected to the third-party site to make your booking. Feeling spontaneous? The Search Everywhere button on the homepage offers a list of the cheapest flight deals for destinations both locally and across the world—just plug in your departure airport first.

Best Price Predictor : Hopper

The company claims a 95 percent accuracy rate at predicting when flights and hotel rates will be cheapest.

Color-coded system makes it easy to determine cheapest days to buy

App is easy to use

Option to track flights and receive alerts when the best time to buy arises

Some have mentioned the app functions better as a research tool than a booking tool

Unclear whether Hopper will price match if you find a cheaper flight elsewhere

Hopper is a travel app available on iOS and Android that aims to help travelers save on airfare by usng historical data and their own algorithm to predict when flights will be cheapest. Just type in where and when you’d like to fly and Hopper will present you with a color-coded pricing calendar indicating how much tickets are likely to cost. (Green is the least expensive, then yellow, orange, and red for most expensive.) Hopper will also recommend you either buy now or wait, or you can choose to watch a trip and receive notifications on the best time to buy. In addition, the app has expanded to offer hotel and car rental price predictions, too.

Some newer features since the app’s inception in 2009 include an option to freeze a price for a limited time—for an extra fee—as well as exclusive app-only discounts. Hopper is free to download, and you can choose to book directly through the app, though some users mentioned they use Hopper as more of a research tool before booking directly with the airline or hotel. The company claims a 95 percent accuracy rate at predicting flight rates up to a year ahead.

Most Innovative : Kiwi.com

This metasearch engine scours the web to piece together the ideal itinerary using planes, trains, buses, and more.

Creative itineraries get you where you need to go, especially if you’ve got a multi-stop trip

Kiwi Guarantee offers rebooking or cancellation protections

Nomad option appeals to travelers with a lot of flexibility

Creative itineraries mean you may not fly out of the same airport you flew into

Kiwi Guarantee has an additional fee

Charges all-in-one fee for booking flights, trains, buses (though you can always purchase a la carte)

Travelers planning multi-city destinations and seeking a bargain, as well as those looking to take planes, trains, and automobiles to get there, might consider Kiwi . Kiwi is a metasearch engine that scours and pieces together itineraries from various airlines (even if they don’t have a codeshare agreement), considers multiple airports (even if your arrival airport is different from departure), and offers booking options, whether you’re looking at very specific dates or more general ones (up to 60 nights).

Some will find the ability to make multiple bookings for a particular trip more convenient than going at it manually several different times, though note that you must opt into the Kiwi Guarantee program to access rebooking and refund protections should your reservation change or be canceled. Kiwi’s Nomad option allows you to plug in a bunch of destinations you’d like to visit and the length of your intended stay, and the website will churn out the most affordable itineraries for review.

Best for Eco-Conscious : Kind Traveler

A give-and-get business model means booking accommodations with exclusive perks, a donation to environmental organizations, and more.

All participating hotels include a local give-back component

Exclusive savings and perks

Participating hotels are located in some of the most beautiful places in the world

Inventory is much smaller compared to other booking platforms

Some of the amenities mentioned are based on availability only

In 2022, Kind Traveler (an online trave agency focused on hotel bookings) announced an increase in environmentally and socially conscious hotels, charity donations, voluntourism opportunities, and additional perks like waived resort fees or a welcome amenity.

Unlock exclusive hotel rates and perks from participating Kind Traveler hotels with a minimum $10/night minimum donation to a local charity. For example, stay at the Six Senses Laamu in the Maldives and receive up to $33 off the nightly rate and perks such as a food and beverage credit and an Earth Lab or Alchemy Bar workshop when you make a donation to Manta Trust. The organization funds coastal research to protect the island nation’s large yet fragile population of reef mantas.

Select from more than 140 participating hotels from the Hawaiian Islands to Bozeman, Montana, and the Maldives. Charities include wildlife, human rights, arts, education, and environmental preservation organizations.

Best for Social Impact : I Like Local

Choose from a host of travel experiences with the peace of mind that 100 percent of the cost goes directly to local partners.

Social impact mission woven into organization’s business model

Immersive experiences led by local guides

Range of experiences offered

May not be best fit for those seeking upscale, luxury experiences and stays

Can’t sort experiences by a list of countries (though an interactive map is available)

No experiences outside of Africa and Asia

For an online travel agency with a booking platform designed to route dollars spent directly to the communities travelers intend to visit, consider I Like Local . Visit the website to browse a host of travel experiences in countries including Indonesia, Kenya, and Cambodia. Experiences include homestays and farmstays as well as wellness and culturally oriented experiences—from cooking and cycling tours to weaving classes.

To search for an experience, select from drop-down items like travel dates and experience categories, or view a global map and click on a country to view experiences that way.

The platform got its start in 2014 and has grown to 4,000 local hosts across nearly 20 countries. As a social impact organization, 100 percent of each booking fee goes to local hosts. To date, 16,000 travelers have booked with I Like Local.

Best for Design-Forward Homestays : Plum Guide

Browse and book seriously vetted, design-forward vacation homes.

Highly curated inventory of vacation rentals across the world

Design-forward

Thorough vetting process

Does not publish guest reviews

Other platforms have homes available across more destinations

When it comes to booking a vacation home, serviced apartment, or condo, travelers are spoiled for choice. Plum Guide is an online travel agency that specializes in accommodations—though not just any home makes its directory. The company claims that each potential home listed on its site must jump through 150 hoops to be included, from internet speed and mattress and pillow quality to the showers’ water pressure and the home’s proximity to dining, shopping, and attractions.

Search by a featured collection on the website such as “ pet-friendly homes ” or “one-of-a-kind homes in Palm Springs.” Scroll to the bottom of its homepage to view its top destinations, as well as a list of all destinations where Plum Guide homes are available, including Barbados, Mexico, Portugal, Switzerland, the U.S., and Turkey. Note: From the top right-hand corner of the site, use the dropdown menu to select currency of choice.

As long as you know what you value most out of your travel experience—such as affordability, social impact, or luxe accommodations—there’s an online travel agency to help plan your next trip. Be sure to read the fine print, as some agencies are third-party websites and not direct vendors. If you're not sure where to start, Booking.com is your best bet for a smooth user experience and hard-to-beat offers on flights, hotels, and other travel arrangements.

What Is the Biggest Travel Agency?

Our choice for best overall, Booking.com, is known as an industry leader with listings for all major hotels, airlines, car rental companies, and more. It boasts more choices for accommodations per destination than any other site, and we found its interface to be user-friendly.

Are Online Travel Agencies Worth It?

This depends on your needs and priorities. The best online travel agencies certainly can save time by booking everything all at once. However, if you're someone who is good at haggling and enjoys the details of planning a trip, you might be able to find better deals by reaching out to hotels or other destinations and speaking to someone personally.

Is It Cheaper to Book Online Than With a Travel Agent?

Not always. A travel agent you know and trust should have the experience and connections to find deals that can match or surpass what you'll find online. Additionally, if something goes wrong, travel agents provide you with an actual person you can use as an advocate to correct the problem . But if you don't have access to a good travel agent, online sites still provide plenty of ways to streamline planning and save money .

We considered dozens of online travel agencies and narrowed down the options based on user experience, volume and quality of inventory, unique offerings and specials, and customer reviews. We also assessed travel companies’ environmentally and socially conscious policies.

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The 10 best online travel agencies in 2024

The top 10 online travel agencies.

• Booking.com
• Lastminute.com

Best online travel agencies for business travel

1. travelperk.

Main offerings and features:

• Industry-leading travel inventory
• Flexible booking with FlexiPerk
• Safety alerts with TravelCare
• Integrated travel policy & approval flows
• Centralized invoicing
• Easy & real-time expense reports
• Carbon offsetting with GreenPerk
• 24/7 fast customer support in target 15s
• VAT reclaim
• Integration with 3rd party tools , such as expense management or HR software like Expensify and BambooHR

Save time and money on your business travel with TravelPerk

2. sap concur.

• Works with some of the biggest brands
• Easy tracking and reporting of expenses for expense reports
• Many connected apps, such as Uber and Airbnb for cars and hotels
• One solution for a variety of business travel spending

Click below to compare both platforms’ features and benefits

• Ample integrations
• Award-winning mobile app
• Employee-centric travel management

Click below for a more detailed comparison between both platforms:

Best online travel agencies for leisure travel, 1. booking.com.

• Intuitive booking tool and website
• Flight + Hotel booking for easily planning trips with no cross-referencing travel websites
• Simple car rental options and taxi hire
• Available in over 40 different languages and offers over half a million properties across 207 countries
• You can book experiences in your destination city to entertain you on your travels
• Genius rewards program

• Simple interface and booking tool
• Deals when making more than one booking
• 38 different languages and offers a 24-hour, multilingual customer support service
• Free cancellation within 24 hours of booking
• Millions of reviews to help make your decision

3. Lastminute.com

• Filter hotels according to budgets, star ratings, guest ratings, board types, and more
• ATOL protection on flight + hotel bundles
• Flash sales for last-minute deals
• Payment plans to spread out the cost of travel
• Extra entertainment booking for your trips, like theatrical productions and day trips
• Gift cards for gifting travel

• Expedia rewards for hotels, cars, and more
• Experienced support
• Compare cruise lines
• Big savings when booking flights, hotels, and car rentals
• Operates in nearly 70 countries and in over 35 different languages
• Luxury travel options

• Book hotels, flights, cars, and bundles
• 24/7 support
• Lower prices on the app
• Great last-minute deals for spontaneous travel

6. Bookmundi

Best online travel agencies for flights

1. skyscanner.

• Super flexible booking filters
• Cheaper flights and hotels than other OTAs
• Price alerts for travel routes of interest
• Easy-to-use booking tool and UI
• Hundreds of location and currency options
• One-way, return, and multi-city travel options

2. Kiwi.com

• Simple flight booking tool
• Partnerships with Booking.com and Rentalcars.com
• Discover deals anywhere with the option to open up your search
• Easy-to-use app

How do online travel agencies work?

What are the advantages of booking through an online travel agency.

• Access to comparison tools
• Peer reviews to help you with your decisions
• Flexible cancellation policies
• All your travel in one place
• Local flights and deals

Rewards programs

Comparison tools, peer reviews, flexible cancellation.

Flexiperk: Cancel anytime, anywhere. Get a minimum of 80% of your money back.

One account for all of your travel needs, a local approach to global travel, wrapping up.

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6 Best Websites for Booking Cheap Flights

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The desire to get a good deal unites practically all travelers. Whether you're looking for a cheap getaway or a luxury vacation, no one wants to spend more than necessary. When it comes to booking flights, travelers may naturally head to an airline's website. However, that's not always the best site to book flights.

Whether it's taking advantage of credit card perks, earning bonus miles or saving money, the best flight booking site can vary depending on your situation and willingness to get creative. Let's take a look at six of the best sites to book flights and when each is the best option.

» Learn more: The best travel credit cards right now

The best flight booking sites

1. google flights.

For ease, speed and features, Google Flights is arguably the best website for flight searches. Search results appear almost instantly. Filters let you narrow down to nonstop options, select a subset of airlines, limit by price or factor in the price of a bag. Similarly, you can use Google Flights filters to avoid certain airlines, multi-stop itineraries, long layovers, early flights or pretty much whatever you might want to avoid.

You can easily check flexible dates, and if you're flexible on where you go you can use the Explore map to see prices for a variety of destinations for certain dates, a certain month or anytime in the next six months.

Google Flights partners with hundreds of airlines and online travel agencies (OTAs) to pull current flight prices. That way you don't have to search each of these sites to be able to see the options. Once you select your preferred trip, Google Flights links you to the top booking options for actually booking your flight — including the airline itself and the best OTA booking options.

The downsides of Google Flights are few. One downside is that Google Flights doesn't always show the cheapest prices — particularly for international flights. That means it's worth double-checking prices on another site before booking through Google Flights.

Like Google Flights, Kayak searches hundreds of other websites and flight booking platforms to find the best deal. Kayak generally doesn't let you book flights directly. However, one benefit of Kayak is the streamlined process. Rather than having to click through several pages to confirm your selection, clicking "view deal" on the results page can take you right to the cheapest booking option.

Also, some travelers may find Kayak's flexible date search a bit easier to work with as you can see results from several days in the search results — eliminating the need to check each day's results separately.

But perhaps the most important reason to use Kayak instead of Google Flights is that it can catch better deals. For example, we found a $550 round-trip flight from Los Angeles to Barcelona using Google Flights. Kayak found a way to lower that price to just $472 round-trip — at least once you scroll past an advertisement.

Note that Kayak manages other flight search sites — including Momondo and Cheapflights — so the results may be very similar between these sister sites.

» Learn more: Is Kayak legit?

So far, we've focused on ease in flight searching, and that's going to be enough for many travelers. However, now let's add in some additional elements to consider when choosing the best flight booking site: earning rewards and saving by booking packages. Expedia excels at both of these.

Through the new One Key rewards program , travelers can earn 0.2% in OneKeyCash from flight bookings made through Expedia. That's not much, but it can stack on top of the awards you earn from the airline and those that you earn on your credit card purchase.

Even better, you'll earn credits toward One Key elite status by booking your flight through Expedia. As you climb up the tiers, you'll unlock up to 20% savings on hotels, get hotel upgrades, priority support and even price drop protection.

Plus, Expedia boasts that travelers can "save up to 30%" when bundling a hotel with a flight booking — although actual discounts are likely to vary.

» Learn more: The pros and cons of Expedia

4. Capital One Travel

For many Capital One cardholders, Capital One Travel might just be the best flight booking site. Part of this is to take advantage of cardholder benefits.

For example, Capital One Venture X Rewards Credit Card holders earn 5x Capital One miles when booking flights through the Capital One Travel portal. Plus, Capital One Venture X Rewards Credit Card holders get up to $300 off travel booked through the Capital One Travel portal each cardholder year.

» Learn more: How to maximize the Capital One Venture X Rewards Credit Card

Also, Capital One Travel can help you truly get the best price for your flight. Capital One partnered with travel data company Hopper to show suggestions about when it's the best time to book.

Capital One backs up these recommendations with money. If you book a flight through Capital One Travel when Hopper recommends doing so, you'll get up to a $50 credit toward future travel if the price drops within the next 10 days.

» Learn more: How the Capital One Travel portal works

Would you be willing to book a trip as two separate tickets in order to save money? That's the idea behind Kiwi. Instead of simply searching flights from your home airport to your destination, Kiwi checks all potential options to get between A and B. That could mean taking a bus or train from your home city to another to catch a flight to your destination. Or, Kiwi might pair a low-cost domestic flight with a cheap international flight from another city to lower your total cost.

Protect your upfront travel expenses by booking with a card that has travel insurance or by purchasing a separate policy .

For example, when we priced out a round-trip flight from Phoenix to Tokyo, the cheapest option when booked as one ticket cost $1,353 round-trip — and that's with an overnight stay in Vancouver.

Pricing out the same itinerary and dates through Kiwi drops the price to just $789 round-trip. The secret? Booking this as two round-trip flights: One from Phoenix to Los Angeles on Frontier and a separate round-trip from Los Angeles to Tokyo on Zipair.

Keep in mind that there are risks with booking separate tickets to get where you want to go. If a delay or cancellation causes you to miss your connection, the second airline/bus/train company isn't obligated to honor your ticket and rebook you on the next option. So make sure to factor in all of the risks of booking travel like this.

» Learn more: When to use Kiwi for your next flight booking

6. BookWithMatrix

ITA Matrix is a very powerful and ultra-customizable search platform for finding exactly the flight itinerary you want — whether that's booking a longer layover, avoiding certain aircraft types or booking nerdy trips such as the Alaska Milk Run .

The catch: Travelers can't actually book flights through ITA Matrix. And, unlike Google Flights, ITA Matrix doesn't even link to the best flight booking site for that itinerary. Instead, travelers are left to attempt to re-create the same itinerary through another flight booking website — which can be hard in the case of certain complex itineraries.

Enter BookWithMatrix. Travelers can copy-paste their perfect itinerary from ITA Matrix into BookWithMatrix to get bookable links through the airline or select OTAs.

Alternatively, travelers have the option to install the PowerTools extension in Google Chrome .

This extension adds booking links right on the ITA Matrix itinerary page, avoiding the need to browse to another page.

Popular cards for booking flights

Depending on the airline and credit card issuer you choose, you may earn anywhere from 1 to 3 miles per dollar spent on the card that you can put towards booking flights.

You usually earn more when you use the card to purchase travel directly from the airline. You could also earn more by making purchases in expense categories that pay bonus miles, like restaurants or gas stations (these vary from issuer to issuer).

on Chase's website

on American Express' website

$0 intro for the first year, then $95 .

$0 intro for the first year, then $150 .

• 2 miles per $1 on United purchases.

• 2 miles per $1 at restaurants and hotels (when booked directly with hotel).

• 1 mile per $1 on all other purchases.

• 2 points per $1 on Southwest purchases.

• 2 points per $1 on Rapid Rewards hotel and car rental partner purchases, local transit and commuting (including rideshare), and on internet, cable, phone services and select streaming.

• 1 point per $1 on all other purchases.

• 2 miles per $1 on purchases made directly with Delta and at U.S. supermarkets and restaurants (including takeout and delivery in the U.S.).

• 1 mile per $1 on all other eligible purchases.

Terms apply.

• 6 points per $1 with JetBlue.

• 2 points per $1 at restaurants and grocery stores.

• 1 point per $1 on other purchases.

• 1 Mosaic tile per $1,000 spent.

When you open a new airline credit card account, you may be eligible for a big welcome bonus after meeting a minimum purchase requirement. After that, you'll continue to earn miles for purchases you would have made anyway.

If you seek more flexibility in redeeming miles for award flights, consider applying for a more general travel credit card instead. A more general travel credit card differs from an airline card in that you can book flights with multiple carriers, rather than reaping the benefits of staying loyal to a single brand.

The more high-end (or 'premium' ) the travel credit card, the more benefits you can enjoy, including airport lounge access or automatic elite status in certain programs. That said, a brand-specific airline card can net you benefits like waived baggage fees, which can have meaningful dollar value.

» Learn more: The best airline credit cards

Final thoughts on the best flight booking site

There's not a one-size-fits-all best website for booking flights. Instead, the best flight booking site for you is going to depend on how simple you want the process to be, whether you're willing to get creative with your booking, and even which credit cards you have.

For most travelers, the simplicity of Google Flights is going to make it the best one-stop shop for searching and booking flights. However, it's worth considering other options if you're flying internationally, want to book a flight-and-hotel package or have a Capital One Venture X Rewards Credit Card .

How to maximize your rewards

You want a travel credit card that prioritizes what’s important to you. Here are some of the best travel credit cards of 2024 :

Flexibility, point transfers and a large bonus: Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card

No annual fee: Bank of America® Travel Rewards credit card

Flat-rate travel rewards: Capital One Venture Rewards Credit Card

Bonus travel rewards and high-end perks: Chase Sapphire Reserve®

Luxury perks: The Platinum Card® from American Express

Business travelers: Ink Business Preferred® Credit Card

1x-5x 5x on travel purchased through Chase Travel℠, 3x on dining, select streaming services and online groceries, 2x on all other travel purchases, 1x on all other purchases.

75,000 Earn 75,000 bonus points after you spend $4,000 on purchases in the first 3 months from account opening. That's over $900 when you redeem through Chase Travel℠.

1.5%-5% Enjoy 5% cash back on travel purchased through Chase Travel, 3% cash back on drugstore purchases and dining at restaurants, including takeout and eligible delivery service, and unlimited 1.5% cash back on all other purchases.

Up to $300 Earn an additional 1.5% cash back on everything you buy (on up to $20,000 spent in the first year) - worth up to $300 cash back!

on Capital One's website

2x-5x Earn unlimited 2X miles on every purchase, every day. Earn 5X miles on hotels and rental cars booked through Capital One Travel, where you'll get Capital One's best prices on thousands of trip options.

75,000 Enjoy a one-time bonus of 75,000 miles once you spend $4,000 on purchases within 3 months from account opening, equal to $750 in travel.

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• Hidden Travel Gems

16 Best TRAVEL Websites To Check Out In 2023 (for Flights, Hotels, Deals)

Beware! Traveling is highly addictive! Once you try out that gathering the most unforgettable memories of your life can cost very little, you will never want to stay comfy at home. We put together a list of the best travel websites that will help to take the first step and GO!

I promise, it’s feasible and verified by many adventurous travelers around the world. Just think how much of your comfort you are willing to sacrifice; where are your personal borders; and what is your inner, deep reason for this particular travel.

Check out also: Best Travel Apps 2022

Here are the top travel websites that should land in the favorites bar of your web browser to help you with traveling:

SAFETY WING – Best Travel Insurance, monthly plans

• Monthly subscription $42/month
• Live chat support
• Covers Covid-related cancellations and expenses

“Better safe than sorry” – you can’t beat that statement!

Safety Wing recently came up with undoubtedly the best travel insurance plan, called Remote Health . It’s a long-term plan that covers you for pre-existing conditions, cancer, or even in your home country. Ideal for long-term travelers or digital nomads.

They also offer amazing monthly plans for short-term travel that come with very competitive prices, starting at $40.

Check the full comparison of digital nomad insurance plans!

Get Your Guide – One of The Best Travel Websites for Booking Trips and Tours

• Trusted tours in 1000+ cities
• Payment online
• Refund options

Skyscanner for flights

• best flights deals and options
• useful monthly calendar
• deals for accommodation with tickets

Let us be honest: amazingly cheap flight tickets are often the first and yet the most important reason we keep on moving our asses from country to country. Even though we promised our inner selves to settle down for a while.  

Don’t blame yourself. Put the blame on Skyscanner, their mobile app and their delightfully intruding newsletter.

Withlocals – Enjoy Your Trip with Locals

• easy booking platform
• discover cities with locals
• hikes, food tours, walks, historical tours, etc.

One of the fastest-growing travel projects of last year that connects travelers with a local community. You can book amazing trips with locals and visit the most authentic places and experience local life. Your guide will help you to get out of tourists traps and find the real spirit of the places you want to visit.

They have easy to use APP interface, a great review system, and their trips are way more affordable than traditional agency tours. No brainer!

FACEBOOK TRAVEL GROUPS

• Travel Community – general travel FB group
• GirlsLOVETravel   – female-only travel FB group
• Young Travelers Network   – for youngsters/post-millennials
• Families Who Love to Travel – family travel group
• Secret Flying – cheap flight deals
• check the full list of travel FB groups on packslight.com

Almost everybody is on Facebook and in a few FB groups but yet, they still forget to check them when they are looking for tips or answers.

Here is the list of the most active and helpful travel FB groups:

Hotel Tonight  – LAST MINUTE HOTEL DEALS

USE CODE “ VVINCEJ ” to get your 25USD discount (minimum spent 150USD)

REVOLUT – Best Conversion Rates (0% fees)

*TOP* APP for TRAVELERS 2020 & Fastest growing FinTech in Europe

If you are a regular traveler and you haven’t tried REVOLUT yet, then you are missing out a lot. REVOLUT is a fairly new Electronic Money Institution which provides you with some “revolutionary” services.

Having an account with Revolut is for FREE , you just need to pay for the shipping of your debit card. All you need to do is register in the app and order the card. Next step is to link your card with some of your other accounts and TOP up. Topping up is FREE and once your money is on Revolut, then you can take advantages of various features like:

• FREE atm withdrawals up to 400 euros
• Real-time spending tracking in the app
• Best conversion rates / no additional fees / middle conversion rate %

Another great advantage is security because you can top up anytime when you are connected to the internet. That means when you are traveling, you can keep you balance somewhere between 0-100euro and if somebody or some ATM scams you, you won’t lose much. You can also block the card anytime when you are connected to the internet.

RentalCars.com & Booking.com

RentalCars has been offering best car rental discounts for ages!  A few months ago they teamed up with Booking.com and became n.1. rental car search engine. Renting a car can get very expensive addition to your budget while traveling.

Especially when you travel solo or just as a couple. Therefore, RentalCars is your best bet in order to find the best discounts.

Hostelworld

If there is some budget for the accommodation and you wish to enjoy a certain level of being incognito and inner peace, definitely look for the best offers among hostels . Sometimes, they can be pretty expensive, too, but HostelWorld knows what people like us need. Definitely, best website for backpackers!

It can also be a way of securing the first night to skip a lovely sleep on the airport benches. Or, and that is even worse, to spend a night in front of the bus station that usually closes at midnight to 4 am.

In this case, book just the first night and then find some shelter at the locals or meet your potential couchsurfer host on-site.

Homeexchange

Swapping houses is a fabulous two-in-one option. You won’t spend a euro on accommodation, and in the meanwhile will get someone to feed your cat and water your roses while you’re off for traveling. Just make sure to get complete references of the swapper and talk together as much as possible in advance.

I confess it might be risky. But on the other hand, the whole active community of HomeExchange is built on trust . See your swappers` former reviews, where and when he or she stayed and what was written about that. Home insurance can also help to enjoy your days off in peace.

If not quite convinced, check the movie The Holiday for a better imagination to see how much fresh air this can bring into your life. Maybe there are huge positive moves ahead!

AirBnb – Apartments Rental

GET 20USD discount on your first trip

Haven’t you heard of AirBnb? Then you are missing out my friend. AirBnb is the perfect tool to find cheap accommodation that allows you to live in the place you are visiting like a local.

With AirBnb you can rent a room that is being offered by a local, and that sometimes means having a room in a family house where you interact with them on a daily basis. If that is just not your style then you can rent out a private house, flat or whatever you want. the possibilities are endless.

And if you travel as a couple, renting an Airbnb can be sometimes cheaper than staying in a shared dorm in a hostel. Apartments are becoming a popular alternative to hotels for budget travelers.

WORLD NOMADS – Best / Budget Travel Insurance

Nowadays, there is no need to highlight how important is to have insurance when traveling around the world! Not having one can lead to serious budget issues and you can end up “broke” and finish your trip very fast.

World Nomads has been offering their services for a long time and became N.1. global/international insurance for travelers.

Trusted by big brands like Lonely Planet, Inrepid, International Volunteers HQ etc. You should definitely have a look on their website before you go on your next adventure.

SE7EN – Volunteering

If you are willing to spend a portion of a day by teaching or decorating the walls of an art gallery for accommodation in return, this is something for you. SE7EN offers lists of the volunteer projects and allows you to contact hosts directly.

You will be requested to pay 15-euro membership at the beginning, but if there will be no project chosen from your side, they offer a  money return guarantee.

Couchsurfing

Be social, spend some time with your host and he will be glad to point out the best places to go in the area. You might experience the best party with his friends diving completely into the local culture.

Feel free to share something with your host. It doesn’t have to be anything valuable. I often show pictures of my current trip or bring something small and typical from my current hometown.

Being a good host is as demanding as to be a good guest. Tolerance is a must on both sides. But above all, it should be fun.

Couchsurfing has turned into the APP as well and you can also find plenty of events/meetups in almost every country. NEW “hang out” option allows you to create an event in your area very fast and catch up with a bunch of travelers for beers/dinner/walk and share some experience from inspiring travels .

Sleeping in Airports

Raise your hand if you have ever slept at the airport. Sometimes it’s about money but sometimes it’s just that your flight departs just so early in the morning that it doesn’t make sense to travel back and forth for more comfortable sleep.

Long sleepovers on the way, objective circumstances you just can’t affect may also leave you stuck at the airport for many hours. This website gathers reviews and experiences of travelers from airports around the world along with useful airport guides to help you survive a sleepover.

Find out where are the electricity plugs, comfortable chairs, quiet areas, free sofas in cafes, wifi passwords, etc.

Handy extra feature we liked is the list of cities where you can enjoy a tour and get to know a city you’re flying through.

Warning: it’s highly possible you will find yourself searching for long stopovers on purpose.

Similarly to Skyscanner, Kayak tool searches for the cheapest flying options from your current location. It beats Skyscanner in the field of multi-city trips and includes searches for nearby airports with cheaper fares.

So now do not hesitate a moment. You have all that you need for your budget travel!

Expedia.com

Expedia is similar to Booking.com, however, it is occasionally less expensive. Expedia Group, Inc. is an American online travel agency for personal and business travel.

Its websites, “which primarily travel fare aggregators and travel metasearch engines, include Expedia.com, Vrbo (formerly HomeAway), Hotels.com, Hotwire.com, Orbitz, Travelocity, trivago, and CarRentals.com.”

When you book through the app, you can save up to 25% on select hotels while earning double points. Their offers will save you even more money on your vacation, which means you can travel more.

The app has a database of over 500,000 hotels around the world.

— PIN IT 🙂 —

If you made it all the way down here, we would like to thank you for visiting and reading! We hope you’ve found some useful information and you enjoyed this list of best travel websites that we put together with a survey and fellow travel bloggers.

If you have any suggestions for a travel website that we should include in this list please, feel free to suggest in the comment section below.

Disclaimer: you might bump into some affiliate links in this article. Those links help us to earn some commission and support our efforts to run this online magazine. We appreciate your support.

I highly recommend these two couchsurfing communities for female travellers:

Host a Sister – Facebook group where women around the world can find accommodations. Travel Ladies – mobile app connecting women who want to travel with other women who want to host them

Very helpful. One point that I would like to add for future reviews is on the issue of customer service, primarily for travel aggregator sites like Expedia, Travelocity, etc. By and large, many of these sites get good reviews for functionality. But customer service for many of these sites, if something goes wrong or your booking is erroneously cancelled, is NONE EXISTENT. Meaning that if you have to travel on short notice for work or family issues, BEWARE.

Please consider checking & adding this one if you wish! Thanks http://www.YouBookTravelHire.com

Thanks. Will do.

Wow this is all great and so useful! Thank you for this amazing guide. I’m traveling soon and had no idea about 80% of these sites! Thank you!

Travel Huge ( https://www.travelhuge.com ) |

Best Travel Website for Flights & Hotel Bookings.

Its New, But Prices are far better than bookit, Kayak, Skyscanner, Hotwire, Priceline .

I had never used Travel Huge before, but an acquaintance told me about how easy and inexpensive last-minute flights and hotels could be using Travel Huge. I booked two round trips tickets for travel within 21 days of bookings.

Thanks for the tip, we will consider adding it 🙂

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17 Best Travel Sites for Hotels, Flights, Tours and Car Rentals

Booking.com tops our list for the best travel booking websites, but there are a few others we recommend for specific purposes.

With so many travel booking websites on the market today, finding the best deals for your travels can be tedious. Thankfully, there are several top travel websites you can use when booking flights, hotels and tours.

From flight aggregators to hostel and hotel booking sites, the websites in this list will make planning and booking your travels a little easier. Whether you’re trying to score cheap flights or find the best tour on the other side of the world, these are the best travel sites for making it happen.

I realize all of this information can be a little overwhelming. Every online travel site out there seems to do something different, and sifting through hundreds of search results to find something you like is time consuming. The offers are endless, but the ideal booking site doesn’t overwhelm its users with options or questionable services.

I have personally used every single company on this list for booking travel , and most play a crucial role in allowing me to adventure around the world. These are the best travel booking sites for helping you plan the ultimate trip.

• Our Top Picks
• Best to Find Cheap Hotels: Booking.com
• Best Hotel Rewards Program: Hotels.com
• Best Site for Vacation Rentals: Vrbo
• Best Booking Site for Hostels: Hostelworld
• Best Booking Site for Hotels in Asia: Agoda

Best Hotel Search Engines & Booking Sites

Finding the right accommodation is one of the most important decisions to make while traveling. Location, amenities, and cost are all factors to consider when looking for the right hotel or hostel for your adventure.

And while there are dozens of hotel booking websites to choose from, finding the right place doesn’t have to be complicated.

Here are the best sites I’ve used for fining hotel deals:

Booking.com : Best to Find Cheap Hotels

Booking.com has, by far, the largest number of hotel search results. With over 5.7 million listings in 227 countries, they’re the first place you should look to find hotels online. In addition to hotels, Booking.com also has hostels, guesthouses, apartments, vacation rentals, and all-inclusive resorts available.

With Booking.com, the advertised price is the final price you pay. Other travel websites may have hidden taxes and fees that aren’t explicitly stated, so you’ll end up paying more than you thought at the reservation desk. But with Booking.com, there are no unexpected fees or hidden resort charges. This makes budgeting and trip planning much easier.

All reservations come with a price match guarantee. That means Booking.com will refund the difference if you find a lower price for your hotel on another website after you book. This best price guarantee is an unbelievable perk that could save you a lot of money in the long run.

And once you make your second booking, you’ll automatically become a Booking.com Genius, which rewards you with member-only discounts and offers (even freebies). It’s like accessing a whole world of insider information without actually having to sign up for anything. Genius members receive 10% to 15% off rates, free breakfast, and free room upgrades.

Plus, Booking.com also lets you search for and book your flight, rental car, and attractions, so you can just put in your travel dates and create full vacation packages from one site!

Hotels.com : Best Hotel Rewards Program

Although they aren’t as big as Booking.com, Hotels.com is still a great option when looking for the best deals on hotels. They have over 300,000 hotels in over 19,000 locations around the world. Besides traditional hotel rooms, they also have apartments, cottages, hostels, motels and all-inclusive resorts.

Like other travel sites, Hotels.com lets you filter the search results by date, price, and amenities. You can also sort by distance to find hotels close to certain attractions or neighborhoods. Plus, look at hotel reviews by real, verified users.

Despite the name, Hotels.com lets you search and reserve more than just hotels. They also have a wide range of vacation rentals available including chalets, condos, and full houses.

One of the main reasons for booking with Hotels.com is to take advantage of their unique rewards program. Once you sign up and book 10 nights, you’ll get to stay one night for free. Your free night can be redeemed at one of their 200,000+ properties in popular destinations around the globe without restrictions or blackout dates. Hotels.com also shares a rewards program with Expedia and Vrbo, so you’ll be able to take advantage of savings with any of these sites.

Hotels.com reward members or app users can also unlock secret deals on accommodation. These are specially negotiated discounts that will save you even more money for certain hotel or accommodation listings.

App users can also find last-minute deals using the “Deal for Tonight” feature. You’ll find huge discounts (up to 40%) when looking for a room with same-day check-in.

Vrbo : Best Site for Vacation Rentals

If you want the comforts of home while you’re halfway around the globe, then Vrbo is an excellent alternative to traditional hotel booking websites. Vrbo is a search engine that lists thousands of homes, vacation rentals, apartments, and condos for anyone who wants to experience a country while living like a local, whether staying in the city center or out in the woods.

Ideal for couples, families, or those needing a bit more privacy, Vrbo lets you relax without the hassle of dealing with a host or other travelers. They also tend to list more luxury vacation rentals that have a much higher standard compared to other rental sites.

For this reason, the vacation rentals on Vrbo might cost more than your average hotel from other travel sites. However, you’ll get much nicer accommodations.

Vrbo also has great customer service. All guests are protected by their Book with Confidence Guarantee, which comes with a 24/7 hotline, payment protection, and even last-minute cancellation coverage. So if your host cancels your booking before you arrive, the Vrbo team will try and find another place for you to stay. You can also buy travel insurance so you get a full refund in case you have to cancel.

In addition, Vrbo has a rewards program called One Key that lets you earn rewards on every dollar you spend on travel. This loyalty program is shared across Vrbo, Expedia, and Hotels.com, so you’ll be able to get package deals no matter how you travel.

Hostelworld : Best Booking Site for Hostels

Hostelworld is the top travel site for researching and booking hostels all over the world. They operate in over 178 countries and have a database of seemingly every hostel in existence.

When looking for a hostel, you’ll find accurate ratings and hotel reviews from real users on this booking site. The review score considers information about security, facilities, services, atmosphere and overall value for your money. And they only accept reviews from people who have booked through Hostelworld, so you know the reviews are genuine.

If you want to save money, Hostelworld is an excellent option for those on a tight budget. That’s because most hostels allow you to book a bed in a dorm room, which is far cheaper than booking a private room. But if you want some extra privacy, some hostels have private rooms with (or without) en-suite bathrooms.

You’ll be able to filter hostels by certain amenities, like free breakfast or on-site laundry. You’ll also see a list of different events happening at the hostel during your stay, from pool parties to pub crawls.

However, Hostelworld really shines when it comes to its great customer service. They will refund the price difference if you find your hostel on another site for cheaper. And if you can no longer go on your trip, you have up 24 hours before check-in to cancel without losing your deposit.

Agoda : Best Booking Site for Hotels in Asia

Agoda started out as the top hotel booking site for hotels in Asia, but since has expanded its offerings worldwide. They also have non-traditional accommodation types like homes and hostels. From capsule hotels in Tokyo to private bungalows in Bali, Agoda has over 2 million properties to choose from.

Generally speaking, prices for Agoda hotels are comparable to other travel websites. However, you can save money by booking a hotel through their secret deals program.

With the secret deals program, the identity of the hotel will remain anonymous until you complete your booking. But you’ll be able to see the hotel’s star rating, neighborhood, and amenities before reserving. Some luxury hotels don’t like to advertise their cheap rooms openly, so this is a way to sell rooms at discount prices without making it too public. If you aren’t set on staying at a specific hotel or chain, this program is an excellent option for saving money on accommodation.

By booking on Agoda, you have the opportunity to maximize your earnings with the Agoda PointsMAX program. Once you sign up and link your Agoda account to one of your other mileage programs, you can earn up to 6,000 points per stay. Some of their current partners include American Airlines AAdvantage, United Mileage Plus and KLM/AirFrance Flying Blue.

Couchsurfing : Best for a Free Place to Crash

If all you need is a couch to sleep on, Couchsurfing will help you to find it. Instead of spending the night in a hotel, you’ll be using this booking site to find a couch to sleep on in the home of a friendly host. Trust me — it’s not as awkward as it might seem!

For those needing a bit more privacy, some people also list their private rooms through Couchsurfing. But generally speaking, you’ll usually be staying in the same living quarters as the host.

You’ll also be able to connect with like-minded people from all over the world who want to share their culture and show you the best parts of their city. They’ll tell you about the best local hangouts and restaurants so you can avoid the tourist traps. They might even be interested in joining you for sightseeing in the city or drinks at the local pub. In my experience, hosts are eager to interact with their guests.

When you’re browsing for places to stay, you can search for hosts by gender, age, language, and house preferences. Whether you’re allergic to cats or looking for wheelchair-friendly accommodation, you can easily find the ideal housemate. Remember, you should be looking at the host just as carefully as you look at the apartment itself. Make sure you read the reviews left by other guests. The more reviews, the more confident you’ll feel about staying with that host.

The goal, ultimately, is for you to return the favor whenever you’re at home, thus keeping the Couchsurfing spirit alive around the world. (Trust me, it can be just as fun to host as it is to surf.)

But best of all, unlike pretty much all other travel websites, Couchsurfing is completely free! It’s customary to bring a gift or cook for your host as a token of appreciation for letting you stay in their place, but besides that, you’ll be able to see the world without spending a single penny on accommodation.

• Best Hotel Booking Websites
• Airbnb Alternatives
• Airbnb vs. Vrbo
• Airbnb vs. Hotels

Cheap Flight Booking Websites & Search Engines

In the world of online travel, booking a flight is one of the most important initial steps to having a great trip. And unless you’re planning on spending thousands to sip champagne in business class, the cost of your ticket will probably be a significant deciding factor in what you book.

Although you could book directly with the airlines, using online travel agencies (OTAs) allows you to compare pricing to find the best rates for your trip. To help you figure out where to book your next flight, consider one of the flight search engine travel sites in this section.

Keep in mind that these search sites are not booking sites . They simply compare rates for flights and redirect you to other sites to complete your purchase. You’ll get tons of results, but it’s up to you to sort through them. You should also take the time to use more than one website to compare pricing. Results may vary!

If they send you to a small website you’ve never heard of, do your research to make sure the company is dependable (although these OTAs don’t tend to deal with shady booking websites—a big reason these are the ones I recommend). It’s important to look at the fine print, as some companies might have their own cancellation fees or change fees in addition to the fees set by the airlines.

Google Flights

It seems that you can find anything you want from Google. There’s Google Maps, Google Scholar, Google News, Google Earth, and now Google Flights.

Google Flights is always the first search engine I turn to when I’m looking for the best flight deals. They scan through all available flight options for both major airlines and online travel agencies and then sort through the results to show you the best possible option for your trip. Like Google Maps, or anything else from Google, they’ve really mastered the art of searching, and this is one of the best sites to find deals.

The calendar view makes it easy to pick dates with the best price. And if you haven’t locked down your travel dates, you can check for flights with their flexible date tool. For example, you can search for the cheapest flights in January or even a one-week trip in the next six months.

You can also use the Date Grid in Google Flights to see the cheapest flight combinations for different departure and return dates. Or, check the Price Graph to compare how the prices are likely to change over the next few months. This is a great tool for identifying significant price drops for your desired route.

Many times you’ll want to search for a specific airport, but if you’re also flexible with your destination, you can search for flights by continent or country. This flexible search is an excellent option if you’re looking for a last-minute weekend getaway without a set destination in mind.

And unlike other travel websites, Google Flights will make sure you’re getting the best rates by offering money-saving recommendations. They’ll let you know that by flying in two days later — or to a different airport nearby — you could save even more money.

Whether you’re booking an RTW adventure, a weekend getaway to New York or simply browsing for inspiration for your next trip, start with Google Flights. And if you’ve got the time to really learn how to use Google Flights , I highly suggest it. Knowing how to squeeze the most out of this incredible tool is a skill well worth having.

Skyscanner is a great travel site for cheap airline tickets, and it’s always my second stop after Google Flights. They search through over 1,200 different airline companies and smaller OTA sites to compare the best offers for your travels.

You can also use their “Everywhere” search engine to look up the cheapest flight going anywhere in the world. The results show the average price for a country, so you’ll need to narrow down the search by destination city to see the exact price for a specific airport. However, you’ll get a better idea of which countries tend to have cheaper flights.

It’s also easy to filter for nonstop flights, included luggage, nearby airports, departure/arrival time, and more so you can find deals on the exact flights you’re looking for.

I recommend downloading the Skyscanner app. Not only can you search and book flights through the app, but you can also use the “Explore” feature to find destinations for solo travel, quick getaways or last minute trips (which is especially handy if you’re traveling open-ended).

One last bonus: Skyscanner also lets you search for deals on hotels, vacation rentals, rental cars, and even complete vacation packages. This travel site has it all.

Momondo is another flight search engine that should be on your radar. This company scans through thousands of airline companies and OTAs to display rates for both domestic and international flights. And unlike other sites, Momondo shows prices for many of the smaller OTAs overlooked by Google Flights and Skyscanner.

I also use Momondo to find out when the best time to fly is. I particularly love their matrix that highlights an entire month, meaning you can compare prices to find the lowest price possible.

On the search results page, Momondo offers bar charts that show prices for different departure and return dates. You can use this feature to spot any significant price drops for flights if your dates are flexible. Play around with these features — it takes some getting used to, but once you get the hang of it, you can score some fantastic travel deals.

You can also look at the “Flight Insights” page to see price trends and analytics for your exact route. This page uses historical search data to show you the cheapest month, day, and even time of day to book. It will tell you the cheapest airlines that serve your route, along with how far in advance you should be booking to save the most money.

In addition, you can consult the “Price Forecast” feature to see if prices are expected to increase or decrease in the near future. If so, you can set a price alert to notify you if the cost of your flight drops.

Dollar Flight Club

Finding inexpensive flights can be time-consuming, but Dollar Flight Club simplifies the process by sending exclusive deals straight to your inbox. Most of their offers are 60-90% off the list price, with savings averaging around $500 .

Dollar Flight Club uses technology and historical data to find cost-saving deals. Although you can’t search for specific dates or destinations, you will still find great domestic and international deals if you’re flexible with your plans.

When you sign up for the free version of Dollar Flight Club, you’ll get one email a day for your selected departure region. Or, you can upgrade to premium to get four times as many deals for multiple departure airports. Premium members also receive instant SMS alerts as well as deals for cheap domestic flights over the weekend. Signing up for Premium Plus will give you access to their rewards program with more deals and offers for tickets for business and first-class flights.

Going (Formerly Scott's Cheap Flights)

Going was formerly known as Scott’s Cheap Flights, and it is another one of my favorite travel sites for finding affordable flights. Like Dollar Flight Club, they send emails for flight deals on domestic and international airline tickets. Most deals are 40-90% off the original price!

But instead of using an algorithm to find great deals, members of the Going team search all of the fares by hand to find deals. This goes a step above others to make this one of the best travel sites out there.

When you sign up for the free version, you’ll receive 15-20 selected deals per month. Even though you’ll select a specific airport as your preferred point of departure, it includes deals from an array of different cities. If you only want to see deals from your specific city, then you’ll want to upgrade to the premium version. Not only does the premium membership include an extra 30-35 deals per month, but it also includes error fare flights and offers for summer and holiday travel.

While Scott’s Cheap Flights has rebranded and changed the name, it’s still an awesome place to find flights for your vacation package.

• How to Find Cheap Flights
• Cheap Flight Hacks
• How to Use Google Flights
• 11 Genius Hacks to Take the Stress Out of Flying
• How I Booked an $8,967 First Class Airplane Ticket for $5.60

Recommended Tour Companies

Sometimes, we all need a little bit of adventure to keep us on our toes while we’re on the road.

Maybe you’re a solo traveler interested in joining a group backpacking experience through Asia. Perhaps you want an action-packed itinerary full of hiking, diving, and bungee-jumping (just make sure you have travel insurance that covers those adventure activities). Or maybe you simply want an agency to take the stress out of planning by giving you a list of all the top places you must visit. Whatever your reason, here are the best travel sites for tours and fully guided vacation packages.

GetYourGuide

GetYourGuide is a search engine with a massive database of tours and attractions in over 7,000 destinations around the globe. I’m talking more than 40,000 activities like street food tours, skiing and snowboarding trips, skip-the-line museum passes, and boat excursions. You name it, GetYourGuide has it, and their one of the best sites for finding and reserving travel activities.

If you’re visiting a new city for the first time, GetYourGuide also takes the hassle out of planning the perfect itinerary. You can reserve your spot on a tour or purchase your tickets for an event directly through their website or mobile app.

Best of all, all tours come with detailed reviews full of handy insider information, so you can hear first-hand from past clients if the activity is worth it. Not to mention, most of the offers are more affordable than if you were to book directly at the attraction itself.

It’s not the best place for all-inclusive vacation packages, but when it comes to travel sites for tours, GetYourGuide tours are a great way to soak in the culture of a city. From wine tasting to helicopter rides to snorkeling, you’ll be able to get the lowest price (guaranteed) by booking on GetYourGuide.

G Adventures

If group tours are more up your alley, then G Adventures is one of the best sites for you. Whether you’re traveling Europe by train, cruising through the Galapagos, or cycling through the countryside in China, there’s a tour for almost every traveler.

These aren’t your run-of-the-mill group tours. G Adventures are small groups (averaging 10 travelers) that all share a common desire to explore the world. When you look online, you’ll see tours organized by travel style. You’ll be able to book vacation packages specifically catered to 18 to 30-year-olds, tours focusing on health and wellness, and even active tours for adventure lovers.

Solo travelers are also welcome to join a tour with G Adventures. Whether you’re looking for full vacation packages or short day trips, you can expect to meet some awesome people along the way.

They’ve also partnered with National Geographic to create immersive tour experiences. Whether you’re learning how to tango in Argentina or cooking authentic meals with a local Thai family, these tours will give you a deeper appreciation for your destination’s history and culture.

Intrepid Travel

Intrepid Travel is like G Adventures in many ways — they offer small-group tours for adventurous travelers in more than 100 countries. Tours are divided into themes, like adventure cruising, cycling, and culinary. And if you’re interested in meeting other like-minded travelers, they have also organized trips specifically for people between the ages of 18-30.

But Intrepid sometimes goes to places where G Adventures does not, and vice versa. Intrepid also has tons of amazing deals available year-round. Many trips are discounted up to 50% and some tours can be reserved with just a $1 deposit. And if you’re eager to leave ASAP, then you can browse a variety of last-minute deals.

They’ve also partnered with Lonely Planet to create unique, niche experiences. With hundreds of single or multi-day vacation packages, you’ll be able to get off the beaten path to see the world through the eyes of a local.

But the biggest perk of traveling with Intrepid Travel comes down to the group leaders and small group sizes. You won’t feel like you’re just getting carted around because every tour is led by a local guide, meaning you get a more authentic experience.

One important note, for many trips, Intrepid requires you to have travel insurance . That’s a good idea anyway though.

Best Rental Car Sites

For many trips, you’ll need to rent a car to get around once your flight arrives. Finding rental cars can be frustrating and expensive.

Fortunately, by using one of these car rental sites , you can find the best prices and reserve your vehicle ahead of time, so there’s no stress at pickup. These travel websites let you search through many car rental providers, compare pricing, and make a reservation. Here are the best travel sites for finding rental cars:

Rentalcars.com

It’s all in the name here. Rentalcars.com is owned by the same company as the hotel site, Booking.com . It is a search site that lets you find car rentals and easily book them online.

Rentalcars.com has a great streamlined process for searching, filtering, and paying for your rental car. With just a few clicks you can find the best deal and have your car reserved. Plus, listings on Rentalcars.com typically have free cancellation when you book through their site. That’s a big win in my book because I hate stressing about what will happen if my flight is delayed or if I have to cancel my trip.

Rentalcars.com typically has great discounts available. In my experience, I’ve often been able to find the best prices compared to other rental car websites.

They also offer insurance directly though their site, though you may not need it if your travel insurance already covers rental cars.

Ultimately, one of the main things I look for in rental cars is the lowest price possible. Would I like to drive a BMW around on vacation? Sure. But typically I’m saving pennies for a trip and don’t want to spend them all on car rentals.

Priceline is one of the best travel websites to find low-price car rentals. They will often offer “Express Deals” which give you a much lower price than you’d get going directly through a car rental agency.

How do they do it? Priceline was the first travel site to offer “opaque rentals.” While that sounds complicated, it just means that you don’t know what car you’ll get until you pick it up. As long as you aren’t picky, this is a fantastic way to save cash on car rentals.

As a bonus, you can get package deals if you use Priceline to reserve flights, hotels, or even trips with a cruise line. They also have a loyalty program that can help you save on travel over time. For many travelers, this could be a one-stop shop for the ideal vacation package.

Unlike the other travel websites on this list, Kayak doesn’t let you reserve rental cars directly through their website. Instead, Kayak is just a big search site that filters through dozens (or maybe hundreds?) of other rental companies, travel websites, online travel agencies, and other related resources. You put in your travel dates, and Kayak gives you a list of options offering competitive prices. They then give you a link to book your car through the site or company that’s offering the deal.

The benefit of Kayak is that, because it is searching so many different travel websites, you can find great deals that other websites may not show.

If you want help with your entire trip planning process, Kayak also lets you search for flight deals, hotel deals, and even complete vacation packages.

Travel Booking Websites FAQs

What is the best travel site to book through.

Booking.com is the best (and largest) travel booking site.

Is it cheaper to book through a travel agent or online?

Booking online will almost always be cheaper than using a travel agent.

How do I get the best travel deals?

You can get great travel deals by comparing across multiple travel booking sites.

What is the best rental car site?

Rentalcars.com is our top pick for the best rental car website.

What is the best site for cheap flights?

Google Flights is always a good starting point when searching for cheap flights.

Jeremy Scott Foster

I’m curious why Airbnb is not listed, are they not a good option?

Given their high (and increasing) fees, lack of consistency and poor customer service, the TravelFreak editorial team can’t, in good faith, recommend booking with Airbnb. We do consider them to be a viable option, but can’t stand behind them as a company nor recommend them to readers.

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The Complete Guide to Booking Travel Online

What is an online travel agency, and what are the best sites and apps to use to search for hotels and flights we break it all down for you..

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There’s a lot to navigate when researching and booking travel online.

Photo by Rawpixel.com/Shutterstock

My first travel adventure was to Venezuela. I booked the ticket with a travel agent over a pay phone. The agent searched a dozen flight itineraries over a few days, all so I could save $15.

Times have changed. Today, flight searches start online , often on your mobile device. Passengers book either directly with the airline or hotel or with online travel agencies. Rarely do we get on the phone. In fact, American Airlines and United Airlines charge $25 to make a domestic flight booking by phone. And pay phones hardly exist anymore.

So, what is the best way to book online? Here is our complete guide to online travel agencies, search tools, and the variety of booking options available on both mobile devices and desktops.

What is an OTA?

An online travel agency, or OTA, is a website or mobile app that allows users to search for and book travel services such as flights, hotels, car rentals, cruises, and activities. The booking is made directly with the online travel agency but confirmed by the service provider, such as an airline or a hotel. As a customer, your relationship is with the OTA.

What are the main OTAs?

Many online travel agencies nowadays are owned by two main companies: Expedia and Priceline. The Expedia Group is the largest online travel agency in the United States with 70 percent market share, according to travel data firm Phocuswright. Expedia Group operates Expedia.com , Orbitz, Hotels.com , Trivago, CheapTickets , Hotwire , Vrbo , and Travelocity .

Priceline is a major competitor to Expedia, with global revenues larger than the Expedia Group. The company owns Priceline.com, Booking.com, Cheapflights, Momondo, and Kayak—the latter two being metasearch engines (more on that below).

There are also independent newcomers such as Hopper (a mobile-only booking tool) and Kiwi.com (which allows you to book flights on air carriers that don’t normally have a commercial relationship).

Are OTA fares lower than booking directly?

Generally, no. The fares that are displayed by an OTA will be similar if not slightly more expensive when compared to an airline’s website. They’re usually only a few dollars higher or lower. The OTAs charge a booking fee to the airlines, and often that fee is passed directly to consumers. For example, Lufthansa tacks on an additional $18 to any booking made through an OTA for Lufthansa flights. The same flights are exactly $18 cheaper on the airline’s website.

Where you can score a good travel deal through an OTA is when booking a last-minute hotel and flight package. Many OTAs have cut agreements with airlines allowing last-minute travelers to access lower rates than are typically available when passengers book a flight alone.

Are all airlines available to be booked through OTAs?

No. Many OTAs do not display flights from some of the low-fare leaders. For example, Southwest and Allegiant flights are not available through OTAs; the same goes for Ryanair in Europe. And, earlier this year United Airlines threatened to pull out of Expedia altogether, only recently signing a multi-year agreement to stay in. The airlines would rather not lose any margin to online travel agencies in an already low-margin industry and would rather maintain a direct relationship with the customer.

Are smaller OTAs safe to use?

Expedia and Priceline are the two largest players in the online booking space, but there are dozens of independent OTAs, such as CheapOAir, OneTravel, JustFly, and SmartFares. Confusingly, you might actually stumble on ads for these OTAs while using Expedia or Priceline sites. That’s because the larger OTAs earn revenue through advertising, sending passengers to smaller OTAs and charging those OTAs for the favor.

Buyer beware: some of these lesser-known OTAs are masters at hidden fees. For example, a flight search on JetBlue allows for free seat selection in many instances. If you perform the same search on FlightNetwork, an independent OTA, and select a seat, you will be charged an additional $25—despite the fact that JetBlue doesn’t charge a seat selection fee if you book directly.

What if you need to change your itinerary?

Itinerary changes are often a pain. If your plans change, it won’t matter whether you’ve booked directly with an airline or with an OTA—you’re going to pay fees for the privilege, if you can even change your ticket at all.

For example, CheapTickets.com, which is part of the Expedia Group, charges $25 to change or cancel a ticket if that change is requested after 24 hours of making the booking—it is free if you do so within 24 hours of booking. However, the fees go up from there. JustFly, an independent OTA, charges a $75 fee for changes to domestic flights in addition to airline change fees, plus the difference in fare, for tickets that can be changed. For an international trip, the fee rises to $200. That means to change an international flight with Delta (which charges a $100 change fee) booked through JustFly, you’ll be assessed $300 in fees, plus the difference in fare. At that rate, you may as well book a new flight. FlightNetwork indicates in its terms of service that changes may incur a change fee but doesn’t specify what those fees are. That hardly makes the few dollars you saved by booking with the OTA in the first place worth it.

What is an OTA price match policy?

To assure travelers that they are getting the lowest fare possible, many OTAs have a price match policy. The rules vary and so do the benefits.

For example, if you book with Orbitz and find a less expensive flight, car rental, or activity on any U.S.-based website within 24 hours of your booking, Orbitz will refund you the difference you paid. And it works: I have personally found a flight in the same class, on the same airline, for the same origin and destination cities, and requested Orbitz to refund the difference of around $35. Within a few weeks, I received a check in the mail. A similar program applies for CheapOAir, but there’s a catch—the price difference must be found on a major OTA such as Expedia or Travelocity.

Expedia has a particularly good price match policy, but you have to pay extra for it at the time of booking. Expedia offers the price match option as an add-on that costs between $5 and $30 when you book. With the price match applied, if the airfare on Expedia drops between 120 days of the flight and up to six hours before the flight, Expedia will automatically refund you the difference in fare. Unfortunately, fares generally do not drop substantially as the travel date approaches, so while this might give you peace of mind, it’s probably not worth the expense.

How do Google Flights and other travel metasearch engines work?

Frequent fliers are likely familiar with websites such as Google Flights, Kayak, Momondo, or Skyscanner. On these websites, passengers search on the site but are redirected to the service provider to complete the booking, such as an airline, rental car company, or hotel.

Metasearch started with a product called ITA Matrix, which is a tool for searching airfares online but not for actually booking online. ITA Matrix allows for multi-city searching, such as setting two different departure or arrival airports, and for offering a calendar view of fares for easier comparison. That company was acquired by Google in 2011, and savvy travelers swear by it to help find the least expensive fares online. Most consumers are more familiar with Google Flights, which has gained traction more recently not least because it has the benefit of being displayed first in search results on Google.

Metasearch engines receive distribution fees from the airlines for sending traffic to the supplier websites. There are no additional hidden fees for using a metasearch engine because you’re booking directly with the airline or hotel.

A major benefit of the metasearch engines is their price tracking tool, which lets users know whether the displayed fares are low, average, or high for the flight, allowing travelers to make a more informed decision on whether to book a flight or not . Google Flights and Kayak, for instance, both have price tracking tools.

Why not just book directly?

The airlines would definitely much rather you book directly with them. Over the past five years, they have gotten much better at marketing and selling their product directly to consumers online and through mobile sites and apps. But in the past, they weren’t so good at it. In fact, Delta, Northwest, United, American, and Continental got together to invest $145 million to launch Orbitz in 1999 to counter the threat from Expedia. Now Orbitz is owned by Expedia.

The airlines also try to encourage customers to book directly so that they can maintain a closer relationship with them. It allows carriers to connect bookings with loyalty programs and create special offers and discounts catered to individual passengers.

There is another benefit to booking directly. The U.S. Department of Transportation requires carriers to hold a reservation at the quoted fare for 24 hours without payment or allow a reservation to be cancelled within 24 hours without penalty, so long as the booking is made at least seven days before travel. The law applies, however, only to U.S. and foreign air carriers that have websites marketed to U.S. consumers. This means that, in theory, an online travel agency does not have to offer such a policy, although most OTAs do.

What are the options for booking on your mobile device?

Airlines and the major OTAs all have apps to help you book and manage your trip on your mobile device, but their functionality is lacking compared to these websites’ desktop editions. For example, Expedia’s app doesn’t allow you to view flights on a month-view calendar. Kayak has an app with more bells and whistles and a better user interface, including a month-view calendar with color-coded pricing. It also has a handy “augmented reality” function to help you see if your carry-on bag will fit in the overhead bin (a feature originally developed by KLM). Point your phone’s camera at the luggage, and it’ll give you the dimensions.

While apps are improving and gaining in popularity, you still might find it easier to locate the best deals on flights and hotels by using your desktop, where you can have multiple tabs open and have all the available search tools at your disposal. Apps are fine for booking directly with an airline once you know which flights you want to book.

If you’re determined to use your mobile device, you may want to look into Hopper. Hopper is a mobile-first flight booking tool that has a solid price prediction tool. You can research travel options and book directly on the app. Another benefit of Hopper: Of its team of 300 employees, nearly half are dedicated to customer support and are based in Canada versus some OTAs and airlines that outsource much of their customer service further afield.

The bottom line?

Like many travelers, I enjoy a flight deal as much as the next person, but I also don’t like any added hassle. I typically start my travel searches using the ITA Matrix or Google Flights to get a general sense of the fares. It helps to know what is a good deal and what is expensive for a particular route. I do my research, typically on a desktop computer. When I’m ready to book, I’ll book directly with the airline. I’ve found that customer service is better when booking directly with the service provider. But I’ve also saved money by using OTAs and have booked with them, too. Whichever way you choose to book, you can be safe in the knowledge that finding and purchasing travel online is a lot easier today than searching for a deal with a travel agent on a pay phone.

>> Next: How to Get the Best Last-Minute Travel Deals

Are Online Travel Agencies Safe To Use? 👨🏻‍💻 17 Best Online Travel Agencies For Seamless Journeys: Travel Like A Pro ✈️

Are Online Travel Agencies Safe To Use? Online travel agencies are generally safe to use, but it’s essential to choose reputable and well-established platforms with positive customer reviews.

The rise of online travel agencies (OTAs) has made travel planning and booking extremely easy in today’s world.

By providing passengers from all over the world with a variety of services, offers, and packages, these platforms have changed the travel business.

Online travel agents can help you with your search for flights, hotels, holiday packages, or tours.

🤔 What are online travel agencies?

4. travelocity, 5. skyscanner, 6. lastminute.com, 8. trip.com, 10. booking.com, 11. expedia, 12. tripadvisor, 14. priceline, 15. cheapoair.

• 🧐 Things To Consider While Making Reservation Through OTA's

⭐ Advantages & Disadvantages of Online Travel Agencies

Q. is it cheaper to book online or through a travel agent, q. do online travel agencies offer better deals than airlines and hotels directly, q. can i trust user-generated reviews on online travel agency platforms, q. do online travel agencies provide customer support, q. are there any hidden fees when booking through online travel agencies.

• Q. Are the Online Travel Agencies Reliable?

Q. Do Online Travel Agencies offer personalized itineraries?

Q. are online travel agencies more expensive than booking directly, q. can i book international trips through online travel agencies, 😇 conclusion, 🗨️ tell us in the comments as per you which one is the best online travel agencies.

Online Travel Agency (OTA) is the name for a website that sells travel services. It lets customers book flights, hotels, and other trips all from one place. They are like a travel agent in the digital world.

📃 List of 17 Best Online Travel Agencies at Your Fingertips

After a lot of research and considering travelers’ reviews we have shortlisted some of the best online travel companies that are operational nowadays.

• Travelocity
• Lastminute.com
• Booking.com
• TripAdvisor

A US-based internet travel company called VRBO focuses on vacation rentals. Landlords and managers can directly register their houses on VRBO, similar to Airbnb.

When booking through Vrbo, visitors may also get travel insurance. In addition to being a part of one of the largest travel companies in the world, VRBO has a reputation for being a trustworthy lodging option.

A website called Parkos.com makes airport parking stress-free. Thanks to the company’s new online platform, potential consumers can now compare various airport parking and facilities, make a reservation, and pay for it in advance of their trip day.

Both locals and visitors have provided overwhelmingly good feedback since Parkos entered the parking sector in 2014.

All technologically aided services revolve around giving automobile owners confidence that their vehicles are safe when they are away from them.

The majority of people may gain more from this comparison, but those who drive pricey high-end cars may find it interesting.

Also Read: 10 Best Places For New Year Celebration

Hotel reservations are the focus of Agoda , a multinational online travel firm located in Singapore.

Along with many other comparable OTAs on this list, it is owned by Booking Holdings, the parent company of Booking.com.

The Agoda network, which offers more than a million hotels and vacation rentals, is primarily focused on the Asian economy but has now grown into Europe and the United States.

The company’s marketing strategy is centered on giving customers affordable or reduced housing.

In 1996, Travelocity was established as an online travel agency with several services for customers. It is owned and operated by the international travel service provider The Expedia Group.

You can check for airfare and hotel bundles, choices for a rental vehicle, cruises, and more using Travelocity’s website.

Additionally, you can read travel-related articles, order tickets for well-liked attractions, and communicate your journey arrangements with loved ones.

A well-known company with a big customer base is Travelocity. They provide a huge selection of vacation packages, many of which are aimed at families.

Skyscanner is a metasearch aggregator that gathers prices for flights, hotels, and rental cars from all online travel agents (OTAs) in one location. Booking flights and hotels with Skyscanner typically results in the most affordable options.

After making your choice, you will be sent to a third-party booking form on the Skyscanner website where you can complete the transaction and reserve your flight.

Skyscanner is used by millions of people to compare rates and options for their travel arrangements. Simply said, it compiles and presents to customers all of the offers from all online travel agencies (OTAs).

Also Read: 15 Best Countries For Solo Travel 

City hopping is a popular pastime in Europe because of how close together the cities are. Among the top three booking sites is lastminute.com .

In this OTA, flight bookings are made through an aggregator website, and hotel reservations are made through an OTA, both of which we have seen before.

Finding last-minute discounts on hotels, flights, and all-inclusive holiday packages is the specialty of the website lastminute.com.

If you’re brave enough to play the chicken, Last Minute has the best travel deals. For tourists looking for a dealer who isn’t scared to wait until the last minute, there are a couple of better OTAs. We’re certain to have the flight or hotel bargain you’re looking for.

Members of Airbnb are allowed to advertise their available lodging and accept overnight reservations. However, the business has added hotels and homestays to its list of offerings.

However, Air b nb is extremely particular about the standards it must uphold when it comes to hotels that can be offered on its platform.

The majority of hotels must demonstrate their distinctive design, how the neighborhood affects their rooms, and how guests can access communal areas.

The most economical choice may be an Airbnb vacation rental. Additionally, compared to hotels, you are more likely to locate more beds in the same property on Airbnb.

Many Airbnbs provide sofas or futons to accommodate larger groups. For longer visits, many of these hotels provide kitchens and washing machines, enabling visitors to save money by preparing their meals.

The largest OTA in China, Trip.com , a Chinese firm, created Trip.com, an international OTA. Trip.com’s marketing initiatives are primarily aimed at domestic and international travelers to China.

Contrarily, Trip.com has a partnership with Booking.com that enables it to broaden its global reach.

Today, Trip.com has hundreds of millions of users worldwide. The organization wants to give both domestic and foreign travelers the best travel experiences possible.

Wotif also owns LastMinute, a website that offers last-minute discounts on lodging, transportation, and other travel essentials to Australians and New Zealanders.

This local internet travel business mostly caters to travelers from the UK and Europe. On this website, tourists can search for and buy flights, lodging, auto rentals, excursions, and package deals.

Also Read: 11 Best Ways To Become A Travel Enthusiast

The biggest hotel booking website in the world, Booking.com , also lets you book travel and a rental car. It can be used by travelers to learn about different types of lodging, locations, and offers.

However, making reservations for different types of lodging is where its true power lies. For the typical person, it serves as an all-inclusive travel agency.

Hotels and other accommodation facilities are only billed by Booking.com after a reservation is made.

There isn’t a monthly cost that must be paid. An all-inclusive internet travel firm called Bookin.com provides lodging and travel options all around the world.

Online travel agencies (OTAs) are a business model used by many E x pedia Group businesses, notably Expedia, the largest OTA.

The company was founded in 2001 and was based in Bellevue, Washington, in the US.

It is one of the most prosperous travel companies in the world, having localized websites in more than 40 nations.

Expedia has provided access to flights, hotels, and rental cars for more than ten years. They are the largest travel company in the world.

Its marketing plan places a strong emphasis on the value of providing affordable lodging options.

Expedia is an excellent option if you want to pay for your airfare, hotel, and car hire all at once.

One of the most well-known travel platforms, TripAdvisor provides a variety of user-generated information in addition to booking services.

Travelers get access to reviews, images, and ratings posted by other travelers, allowing them to plan their trips with greater knowledge.

The website also offers the ability to compare flights and book excursions and other activities, making it a complete online travel agency (OTA).

A meta-search engine called Kayak searches the internet for the finest travel offers on several platforms.

It provides full results on a single page by comparing costs for airfare, accommodation, rental cars, and other services.

Users of its “Explore” feature can find new places to go and the most cost-effective times to travel.

Budget-conscious travelers choose Kayak because of its simple UI and time-saving features.

The “Name Your Own Price” option on Priceline is known for allowing customers to place bids on hotel rooms and rental vehicles at the prices they like.

Priceline provides regular booking choices like flights, hotels, and rental cars in addition to the bidding system, which may not appeal to everyone.

Travelers who are flexible with their travel plans can take advantage of their Express Deals feature, which offers big reductions on unpublished rates.

Travelers seeking low-cost airline options without sacrificing quality are catered to by CheapOair .

The network appeals to people who are concerned about their spending because it offers exclusive deals and discounts on hotels, flights, and car rentals.

CheapOair makes arranging travel reservations simple with its user-friendly interface and round-the-clock customer service.

Flights, hotels, holiday packages, and activities are just a few of the travel options that Orbitz provides.

Orbitz Rewards, the platform’s loyalty program, enables customers to earn rewards and take advantage of special member advantages.

If customers discover lower rates elsewhere, Orbitz guarantees they will be refunded the difference with its price guarantee promise.

Hotwire is known for providing significantly lower rates for accommodation, travel, and transportation.

Partner hotels can offer lower rates without publicly undercutting their usual pricing because the platform hides the identity of specific hotels until after booking.

For tourists eager to take advantage of this method of surprise booking, Hotwire’s “Hot Rates” provide huge savings.

🧐 Things To Consider While Making Reservation Through OTA’s

When making reservations through an Online Travel Agency (OTA), consider the following:

• Price and Deals: Compare prices and look for exclusive deals and discounts offered by the OTA.
• Cancellation Policies: Understand the OTA’s cancellation and refund policies to avoid any inconvenience in case of changes in your plans.
• User Reviews: Check user reviews and ratings to gauge the reliability and quality of the service.
• Customer Support: Ensure the OTA provides accessible and responsive customer support for assistance during and after booking.
• Hidden Fees: Be wary of hidden fees or additional charges that may not be clearly stated upfront.
• Booking Security: Verify the OTA’s security measures to protect your personal and financial information.
• Travel Insurance: Consider purchasing travel insurance for added protection against unexpected events.
• Flexibility: Choose an OTA that offers flexible booking options to accommodate any last-minute changes.
• Available Services: Confirm that the OTA offers the services you need, such as flights, hotels, car rentals, and activities.
• User-Friendly Interface: Opt for an OTA with an intuitive and easy-to-navigate website or app for a seamless booking experience.

Advantages of Online Travel Agencies

• Convenience: Users can book flights, hotels, and other travel arrangements from the comfort of their homes, saving time and effort.
• Wide Selection: Online travel agencies offer a vast inventory of travel options, providing a variety of choices for different budgets and preferences.
• Price Comparison: Users can compare prices across multiple airlines, hotels, and car rental companies to find the best deals.
• User Reviews: Travelers can read reviews and ratings from other users to make informed decisions about their bookings.
• Exclusive Deals: Many online travel agencies offer exclusive discounts and promotions for their customers.
• 24/7 Access: Online travel agencies are available round the clock, allowing users to make bookings at any time.

Disadvantages of Online Travel Agencies

• Hidden Fees : Some online travel agencies may have hidden fees or additional charges that are not disclosed upfront.
• Lack of Personalized Service: Unlike traditional travel agents, online platforms may lack personalized recommendations and support.
• Technical Issues: Technical glitches or website outages can cause inconvenience and delay in making bookings.
• Limited Flexibility: Some online travel agencies have strict cancellation and refund policies, limiting flexibility for travelers.
• Scams and Fraud: There is a risk of encountering fraudulent websites or services when booking through unknown or unverified platforms.
• Overwhelming Options: The abundance of choices on online travel agency websites can sometimes lead to decision paralysis for users.

🙋🏻‍♀️ FAQs For Online Travel Agencies

There are a lot of questions that come to our mind while making reservations through online travel agencies some of the commonly asked questions are answered below.

A. Booking online often offers better deals and discounts compared to traditional travel agents.

A. Yes, online travel agencies often negotiate special deals and discounts with airlines and hotels, which can result in more cost-effective options for travelers.

A. While most user-generated reviews are genuine and helpful, it’s essential to consider multiple sources and exercise discernment when making decisions based on reviews.

A. Yes, reputable online travel agencies offer customer support via phone, email, or live chat to assist with booking inquiries and travel-related issues.

A. While some online travel agencies may charge service fees or have specific booking terms, reputable platforms are transparent about any additional costs during the booking process.

Q. Are the Online Travel Agencies Reliable ?

A. Absolutely! Online Travel Agencies are reputable and reliable. They work with established partners and have a track record of excellent customer service.

A. Yes, they do! Online Travel Agencies take your preferences and interests into account to craft personalized itineraries tailored to your needs.

A. Not necessarily. Online Travel Agencies often secure exclusive deals and discounts, making them competitive with direct bookings.

A. Yes, you can! Best Online Travel Agencies offer a wide range of international travel options and guide visa requirements.

In conclusion, online travel companies have completely changed how we organize and book our journeys.

These OTAs have evolved into crucial tools for modern travelers thanks to their user-friendly interfaces, vast inventory, and affordable prices.

The top online travel agencies included in this article can assist you in organizing an enjoyable trip, regardless of whether you are an experienced traveler or preparing for your first excursion.

Also, don’t forget to book your personalized holiday package with  Fiery Trippers . Let us make your vacation a romantic as well as a dreamy getaway.

How far in advance should I book my flight? ✈️ 19 Best Website To Book Flights For Cheap Airfare

Unlock Your Adventure: 💡 Mastering the 23+ Best International Travel Tips for Seamless Journeys! 🌍✈️ Exclusive Offer Inside!

13 Things Not to Forget When Traveling Internationally: Essential Tips for International Travel

Rahul Siddharth

He is a dedicated travel writer with a wealth of 10 Years + experience that enriches his narratives. He holds a degree in Hospitality and Hotel Administration from IHM Dehradun, which he couples with hands-on expertise in the field. Drawing from his diverse experiences, Rahul's writings offer readers a captivating glimpse into the world of travel. Embark on a journey of exploration and inspiration with Rahul as your guide. Read More

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10 Best Websites for US Travelers

Whether planning that long-awaited post-pandemic vacation or a quick weekend road trip, one thing is certain — travel is back in full force. But with endless options for destinations, the logistics of travel planning can still be daunting.

Where to find the most affordable flights?

What hidden gems provide the best experience for the cost?

Enter the multitude of online travel resources available at our fingertips, offering everything from comprehensive booking sites to niche blogs offering insider tips on a specific locale.

After visiting the highest-praised travel websites over the past year, We’ve honed a list of essential stopovers for trip planning that will meet every US traveler’s needs.

From travel veterans to newbies, families to solo wanderers , business trips to buddy getaways — these sites deliver. Here are the 10 best websites to fulfill your future travel dreams .

1. TripAdvisor

By far the web’s most comprehensive travel planning resource, TripAdvisor helps us explore every destination imaginable through over 859 million reviews and opinions from the world’s most active travel community.

We love exploring user-generated content like Traveler photos and attraction ticket prices to get excited about far-flung destinations.

We always reference TripAdvisor reviews of lodging options before making hotel reservations.

2. Skyscanner

Our go-to source for flexible and affordable flights to just about anywhere, Skyscanner helps us save hundreds of dollars through their unique search algorithm that surfaces discounted flight options from all airlines and OTAs in one place.

We love using their “Everywhere” destination search when our schedules are wide open to travel at the best available price anywhere around the world.

Enabling unique accommodation options from cozy home shares to exotic houseboats in Offbeat locales, Airbnb transforms the conventions of lodging and infuses cultural immersion into every trip.

As monthly travelers on a budget, we rely on Airbnb for full apartment rentals with kitchen access to save on dining expenses, especially abroad where grocery stores provide affordable meal options.

4. Google Flights

Trusted as an unbiased flight search engine, Google Flights analyzes vast historical fare data to predict the optimum time to book flights for top value.

We love their unique map interface for visualizing endless destination possibilities within set budget ranges, their price tracking for monitored trips, and email alerts if lower fares open up after booking.

The premium membership at Going (formerly Scott’s Cheap Flights) gives us elite access to exclusive airfare sales and mistake fares that aren’t advertised publicly elsewhere.

We’ve scored $550 roundtrip flights to Europe and $700 roundtrips to Australia thanks to their curated deals newsletter.

From last-minute getaways to far-flung destinations, this service helps us travel more often for less.

6. Atlas Obscura

Dedicated to discovering the world’s most astonishing forgotten places, Atlas Obscura fuels our sense of wonder and curiosity about what’s hidden in overlooked corners across the globe.

As monthly travelers seeking transformative experiences, we reference their database of obscure sites and unusual attractions to build journeys around destinations that surprise, provoke emotion, and inspire through their stories.

7. Lonely Planet

Regarded as the most thorough travel guide publisher for adventurous backpacker-style exploration, Lonely Planet provides us with endless recommendations on top sites, hole-in-the-wall eateries, affordable lodging, regional transportation how-tos, and safety guidance essential for off-the-beaten-path travel.

We reference Lonely Planet first when dreaming up plans for exotic expeditions to unfamiliar territory.

8. EscapeMonthly

Founded in 2013 with the ambitious vision of transforming modern lifestyle through the lens of travel, our own EscapeMonthly.com provides ongoing inspiring content on gear reviews, destination recommendations, outdoor adventures, self-care promotions, and secret tips to help our audience escape into blissful vacations.

Our notable series on how to travel monthly has encouraged working professionals to maximize their paid time off through thoughtful trip planning.

We pride ourselves on delivering the most worthwhile recommendations tailored to frequent travelers.

9. Travel+Leisure

Offering compelling travel stories and photo essays that transport readers to locales worldwide alongside practical planning content, Travel+Leisure stimulates our appetite for adventurous vacations and offbeat discoveries.

United Basic Economy vs Economy: What’s the Best Choice?

As fans of immersive long-form stories revealing insider perspectives on culture, cuisine, art and history, we eagerly explore new issues of Travel+Leisure for a monthly dose of inspiration.

10. Roads and Kingdoms

With its journalistic approach focused on culture, food and politics, Roads and Kingdoms publishes gripping long-form articles and vivid photography transporting readers into the heart of destinations worldwide.

Their globe-trotting correspondents deliver intimate stories of time spent embedded within remote communities, conflict zones, and locales wrestling with identity.

As travelers continually broadening our worldliness through books, films and music beyond borders, we relish the unfiltered on-the-ground reporting of Roads and Kingdoms for rare perspectives illuminating the human experience.

Final Thoughts

Equipped with this trusty lineup of essential travel websites, we’re able to consistently craft incredible monthly journeys matching our wanderlust bucket lists on modest budgets.

We hope our curation of outstanding utilities for optimized travel savings and inspiration empowers fellow US jet setters to travel more frequently to stretches of the globe both near and far.

Let the journey unfold!

FAQs about United States travelers

How many us residents travel abroad each year.

Before the pandemic, around 93 million Americans went abroad each year for business and leisure travel, according to the US National Travel & Tourism Office. This equates to about a quarter to a third of the total US adult population.

What are the most popular international destinations for American travelers?

Historical and cultural sites in Europe such as London, Paris, and Rome top the list. Mexico and the Caribbean are also highly visited by US leisure travelers seeking warm locales closer to home.

On average, how much do Americans spend on travel each year?

Americans spend over $1,100 per capita annually on travel and tourism expenditures, from the average domestic airfare or hotel stay to activities, dining, shopping, and more.

How much vacation time do American workers receive?

The average American worker receives around 11 paid vacation days per year . However, an increasing amount take only a portion of their total paid time off.

What percentage of US travel is domestic?

About 80% of all American travel destinations are within the United States, especially road trips, which surged in popularity during the pandemic. Domestic air travel now exceeds pre-pandemic levels as well.

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• Top Websites
• Travel and Tourism

Top Websites Ranking

Most Visited Travel and Tourism Websites

Last updated : June 1, 2024

* Some websites ranked in the list above may contain adult content, please use caution when visiting unknown sites.

Most Visited Travel and Tourism Websites Ranking Analysis for May 2024

booking.com is ranked number 1 as the most popular website in the Travel and Tourism category in May 2024. The average amount of time that users spend on the website is 00:08:30 minutes, and they see, on average, 8.32 pages per visit. Pages per visit is a popular engagement metric that is calculated by dividing the total number of website views by the total number of visitors. The bounce rate for booking.com is 35.7%, meaning that 35.7% of visitors leave the website after viewing just one page.

tripadvisor.com and airbnb.com are 2nd and 3rd on the list. In terms of user engagement, tripadvisor.com has an average visit duration of 00:02:49 minutes, an average pages per visit of 3.77, and a bounce rate of 60.05%. Similarly, airbnb.com’s average visit duration is 00:07:48 minutes, its average pages per visit is 18.57, and its bounce rate is 32.75%.

expedia.com is a top Travel and Tourism website that ranks in 4th place. On average, visitors remain on-site for 00:06:06 minutes and 36.2% of those visits bounce after viewing just one page. In addition, the average website pages viewed per visit is 7.68.

Number five on our list is agoda.com, a top Travel and Tourism website. Visitors see 5.87 pages per visit and spend 00:06:15 minutes on the website. The bounce rate for agoda.com is 33.31%.

Come again next month for the updated website ranking & traffic analysis of the most visited Travel and Tourism websites!

FAQs About The Top Travel and Tourism Websites

Question: Which is the most visited Travel and Tourism website? Answer: booking.com is the most visited Travel and Tourism website in May 2024.

Question: Which is the 2nd most visited Travel and Tourism website? Answer: tripadvisor.com is the 2nd most visited Travel and Tourism website in May 2024.

Question: What are the top 5 most popular Travel and Tourism websites in the world? Answer: The top 5 most popular Travel and Tourism websites in the world in May 2024 are: 1. booking.com 2. tripadvisor.com 3. airbnb.com 4. expedia.com 5. agoda.com.

• TRAVEL BLOG

HOTEL BOOKING SITES

Discover the Best Hotel Deals - Book Your Perfect Stay with Ease!

What does Booking.com do?

What is expedia, what is hotels.com , what is hophs.com hotel booking, what is priceline, review: kayak, what is kayak how can you use kayak  .

• Airbnb In the last decade, Airbnb has changed the game drastically when it comes to finding amazing accommodation for your next vacation.

Is TripAdvisor Legit? Is it safe to book with TripAdvisor?

Is agoda legit, what is trip.com, is bookingbuddy.com the cheapest website for flights and hotels, what is orbitz, is travelocity legitimate, is hotwire.com legitimate, is trivago trustworthy and legit, is hotelscombined legit, what is momondo hotels how can you use momondo hotels, what is onetravel hotels, travel forums.

Discover what travelers are talking about from around the globe

What is the Tripadvisor Forum?

• TravelFish TravelFish Travel Forum is an online discussion board for discussing travel to South East Asia, including Burma, Cambodia, I...
• Fodor’s Travel Talk If you’ve spent a lot of time paging through physical travel guides, chances are that you’ve read a Fodor’s Travel Book at o...

What does FlyerTalk.com website do?

• Travellerspoint Forum Travellerspoint is an online travel community with members representing every country in the world.

Helpful Travel Sites

Don’t settle for the middle seat, make flying as comfortable as possible

Is seatguru.com Legit?

• AirHelp Airlines can, without doubt, be difficult companies to deal with, be it amending a flight or getting money back on a delay o...
• Routehappy Routehappy is a product differentiation platform for air travel, aggregating data on aircraft, seat, layover, Wi-Fi availabi...

Travel Guides

Prepare yourself in the best way you can by reading a travel guidebook

• Lonely Planet Iceland Lonely Planet Iceland is a complete guide to travelling to Iceland, featuring recommendations, history, language, culture, c...
• Lonely Planet Ireland Lonely Planet Ireland is a comprehensive travel guide, covering everything you need to know about the island, from climate a...
• Lonely Planet Italy Lonely Planet Italy is a travel guidebook that provides copious information on everything from Italian art to legal matters.
• Lonely Planet Japan Lonely Planet Japan is a comprehensive guide to all the major areas of Japan, featuring itineraries, insider tips and honest...

Instagram Travel Blogs

Get inspired by checking out the latest pics from around the world

• EarthPix Earthpix is an Instagram account that curates inspiring, stunning and often comical travel-related photographs from users wh...
• Beautiful Destination Beautiful Destination is a travel-based Instagram account boasting close to 12 million followers who have been attracted by ...
• Wonderful Places Wonderful Places is a travel-based Instagram account that posts daily photos featuring a range of destinations, from a festi...
• Pretty Cities Pretty Cities is a travel-oriented Instagram account with a focus on cities around the globe, including Amsterdam, New York,...

Food Near Me

Don’t settle for the closest thing; find your perfect restaurant, wherever you go

• TripAdvisor Restaurants TripAdvisor is, and has been since 2000, a unique resource for travellers looking to decide where to eat and drink.
• BonAppetour BonAppetour is a community marketplace that connects travellers with local home chefs for a unique food-orientated experienc...
• OpenTable OpenTable has not only changed the way that people make reservations at restaurants, it has also become a useful tool for de...
• McDonald’s McDonald’s is perhaps the quintessential American fast food restaurant. I

Travel News Sites

Keep up to date on what’s going on around the world

• The Guardian The Guardian Travel is one of the most comprehensive travel news websites available, with all its content free to a...
• CNN Travel CNN Travel is one of the best websites available for discovering the latest updates and interesting articles relate...
• Daily Star Daily Star Travel is a wide-ranging news source, featuring articles from across the globe, with everything from travelling m...

Cheap Flights Sites

Find your wings with our choice of the best sites to book flights

How to get the cheapest flights on Skyscanner Flights?

What are kiwi flights.

• Hophs Flights When it comes time to book a flight for your next big trip, how do you decide on what site to use? With so many cheap flight...

What is Skiplagged?

Last minute travel deals.

Be better late than never and find yourself a trip at the eleventh hour

What is lastminute.com?

What is travelpirates last minute vacation website.

• redtag.ca Last Minute RedTag.ca was started by Canadian three brothers in 2004 and has since developed into one of the leading retail travel agenc...

Is Travel Republic legitimate?

• SellOff Vacations First launched under the name ‘Dream Vacations’, SellOff Vacations has been providing affordable travel to Canadians since 1...
• LateRooms.com Launched in 1999 in Manchester, UK, LateRooms.com currently offers bookings in more than 200,000 properties worldwide.
• LastMinuteCruises LMC With trips offered across all the major cruise lines, including Carnival, Disney, Royal Caribbean and Norwegian, LastMinuteC...

Is Jack's Flight Club legitimate?

Cruise booking sites.

Take the plunge and find your ideal holiday on the seas

What is CruiseDirect.com?

What is cheaptickets cruises is cheaptickets a part of expedia, what is msc cruises is msc cruises owned by carnival, what is cruisecompete, what is cruise.com.

• Carnival Carnival is a website offering cruises from a range of destinations including Alaska, The Bahamas, Hawaii and the Caribbean ...

Travel Channels

Sit back and enjoy great content from the latest generation of travelers

• Mr Ben Brown Mr Ben Brown is a Youtube channel run by Ben Brown, a filmmaker and photographer from London, who uploads vlogs detailing hi...
• Wolters World Wolters World is a travel YouTube channel, aimed at providing viewers with honest, firsthand travel advice from a variety of...
• devinsupertramp Devinsupertramp is a YouTube channel run by American videographer Devin Graham, where he uploads videos featuring adventure ...
• Hey Nadine Hey Nadine is a YouTube channel run by Nadine Sykora, an American travel vlogger who shares videos featuring travel hacks, t...
• Mark Wiens Mark Wiens is travel-orientated YouTube channel, run by a man of the same name who records and uploads videos of himself and...
• Gone with the Wynns Gone with the Wynns is a YouTube channel managed by travelling American couple Jason and Nikki Wynn.

Luxury Travel Sites

Indulge yourself by heading to the land of milk and honey

• Vrbo (HomeAway) HomeAway is an online vacation rental platform that offers more than two million homes in nearly 200 countries worldwide.

What are Beaches Resorts?

• Villas of Distinction Villas of Distinction is a vacation rental company that offers luxury properties ranging from one-bedroom penthouses to 42-b...
• Only Provence Only Provence is a provider of luxury vacation rentals and villas in the South of France.
• Villas of the World Villas of the World is an online service providing more than 3000 luxury villas for rent, in destinations ranging from Cape ...
• Villa Luxe Villa Luxe is a provider of luxury vacation rentals and villas in the Caribbean.

Forget packing your map, get it all straight to your fingertips

• Google Maps Google Maps is a web mapping service offering satellite imagery, street maps, 360 degree panoramic views, real-time traffic ...
• MapQuest MapQuest is a free online web mapping service that offers a point of interest search, voice-guided navigation, real-time tra...
• Here WeGo HERE WeGo is a free maps and navigation mobile application and desktop web mapping service, launched in 2016.
• AllTrails AllTrails is a crowd-sourced platform that helps people explore the outdoors by providing more than 50,000 trails worldwide,...
• Waze Waze is a community-based traffic and navigation mobile application that allows drivers to share real-time traffic and road ...
• Maps.me Maps.me is a free mobile application that provides offline maps in 345 countries worldwide.

Travel Guide APPs

Navigate new locations like a local

• Travel Noire Travel Noire is a website that offers downloadable travel guides to various destinations around the world, from Marrakesh to...
• Detour Detour is a mobile application that offers GPS-enabled guided walking tours using the voices of famous people and local expe...
• 12hrs 12hrs is a travel website that contains travel guides that will take you off the beaten path to help you discover the best s...
• 48 Hour Adventure 48 Hour Adventure is a blog dedicated to short term travel for time-strapped people who want to explore areas nearby, whethe...

Work And Travel

Enrich your travels and give something back by working as you go

• Fiverr Fiverr is an online marketplace for freelancers, allowing writers, designers, translators, animators and other creative prof...
• Upwork Upwork is a platform that provides an interface to easily connect freelancers with businesses.
• Freelancer Freelancer.com is a crowdsourcing marketplace that connects employers with freelancers across a range of projects, including...
• Workaway.info Workaway.info is an online platform that connects hosts with travelers, in order to provide a culturally enriching experienc...

Useful Travel Software

Find travel software that is worth installing!

Car Rental Sites

Give your feet a break and book the car of your dreams

• Rentalcars.com Rentalcars.com is an online platform that aims to give its customers a smooth, hassle-free experience when booking their nex...

What is Hoophs.com Car Rental?

Why are skyscanner car rental prices so much lower than other sites.

• Priceline Rent A Car Part of the Booking.com family, priceline deals with everything from hotels to flights to package cruises.

What is Enterprise Rent-A-Car?

Best travel blogs.

Put the guidebook aside and discover some first hand experiences

Review: Vrbo (Vacation Rentals by Owner)

What is vrbo.

• Love Home Swap With the recent rise in the popularity of the sharing economy, it’s unsurprising that a company like LoveHomeSwap has risen ...
• couchsurfing Coachsurfing is a global community of travellers and hosts, boasting over 400,000 homes and more than four million surfers e...

Camping Sites

Pitch up, light a fire and immerse yourself in nature

• Booking.com Camping Although usually associated with booking predominantly hotel and hostel accommodation, Booking.
• Hipcamp Camping has always been a great way for travellers to experience new locations by getting away from the luxury of a hotel an...
• Campsites.co.uk With such a rich abundance of open, green space, the United Kingdom is without doubt one of the best countries to go camping...
• campingdirect.com CampingDirect.com is a website that offers campsite reservation in over 5,000 spots across 14 European countries, including ...
• Reserve America Founded way back in 1984, Reserve America are leading experts in outdoor recreation, offering campers the opportunity to fin...
• Campendium Campendium offers information on a selection of thousands of places to camp, from luxury RV sites, to free spots with stunni...

Language Learning Sites

Speak like a local by learning the lingo wherever you go

• Coursera Coursera is an online learning platform that offers courses, specialisations and degrees by working with universities and ot...
• italki italki is a language-learning platform that connects thousands of teachers with students to help them practice their speakin...
• Babbel Babbel is a membership only language-learning platform based on lesson modules, vocabulary practice and social learning that...
• Duolingo Duolingo is a free language-learning mobile application and website that offers more than 50 language courses across 23 lang...
• Memrise Memrise is a freemium study app that features a range of content to aid in learning a foreign language.
• FluentU FluentU is an immersive language-learning platform, based on the idea that people learn best when offered memorable and auth...

Trip Planner Sites

Don’t just wing it, get help planning your trip

What is ViaMichelin?

• Lonely Planet Having sold over 120 million guidebooks since its inception in 1972, Lonely Planet are one of the most trusted names when it...

What are Klarna Trips' website services?

• Google Trips Google Trips is a travel planning mobile application that helps you plan your ideal half or full-day itinerary by recommendi...
• TripIt Tripit is a mobile application that creates itineraries for trips by using your travel confirmation emails, such as flight, ...
• Roadtrippers Roadtrippers is a travel planning website and mobile application that allows users to plan journeys and discover new places ...

Best Travel Reddits

Discover the best travel information, all with a simple scroll of the mouse

• r/travel r/travel is a Reddit community centred around exploring the world through travel, featuring photos, questions, stories and t...
• r/Backpacking r/backpacking is a subreddit for travellers looking for inspiring ideas, hints questions, advice and photos.
• r/CampingandHiking r/CampingandHiking is a subreddit dedicated to offering advice and giving people the chance to ask questions about everythin...
• r/SoloTravel r/SoloTravel is a Reddit community containing over 420,000 members for all those interested in sharing their photos and stor...
• r/DigitalNomad r/DigitalNomad is a subreddit for people who want to share their tips, advice and first-hand accounts for making money while...
• iwantout reddit IWantOut is a subreddit that was created in 2009 and has since then gained over 1.2 million members.

Photography Sites

Capture every moment in high resolution, with best apps or own photographer

• VSCO Visual Supply Co., or rather VSCO, is a mobile application that allows users to edit photographs using the various ‘presets’...
• PicCollage PicCollage is a photo editing mobile application that allows users to crop photos, choose layouts, add stickers, text and fr...

Is Flytographer legit?

• Photoshop Lightroom Adobe Lightroom is a photo editing platform that allows users to access, edit and share photographs from any browser, whethe...

Travel Health Info Sites

Keep on top of your well-being by knowing where to go wherever you are

• CDC Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, or CDC, is the leading national public health institute of the United States.
• Sit or Squat Sit or Squat is a mobile application designed to help people find public bathrooms while they

Plan My Trip

Let the pros plan and organize your trip

Discover the World with Ease: A Comprehensive Review of uTravel. SEE ALL 1 SITES Vacation Packages

Book a perfect all-inclusive vacation package for you and your family

• United Vacations United Vacations is the full-service travel agency created by United Airlines, which is one of the largest and most powerful...
• Intrepid I’m all in favor of changing the game when it comes to booking trip itineraries and accommodations. T
• SouthwestVacations If you are looking for a solid, reputable company to book your flight and accommodations through, Southwest is a pretty grea...

What is AppleVacations?

• icelolly.com Icelolly.com has a funny name, that much is immediately obvious.
• Disney Holidays For several decades, Disney has been one of the leaders in tourism and travel in the United States and abroad.

Who is Great Value Vacations?

What is funjet vacations is funjet vacations a travel agency.

• Insight Vacations Insight Vacations is one of the premier destinations for booking travel.
• Compass Holidays There are hundreds of online travel agencies out there, but using them can often be difficult, frustrating, and unclear when...
• Virgin Holidays Brought to you by the same reputable Virgin group that has brought us several other industry-standard companies, Virgin Holi...
• Cosmos Cosmos has been in existence for more than 50 years.

RV Rental Sites

Take your accommodation with you by finding the best motor-homes

• RVshare RVshare is one of the world’s biggest online RV rental marketplaces, offering every type of RV imaginable, from affordable p...

What does Outdoorsy do?

• Cruise America Cruise America is an online marketplace offering RV rentals across the US and Canada.
• Motorhome Republic Motorhome Republic is an online motorhome rental service operating in more than 30 countries worldwide, with over 450 depots...
• Vroom Vroom Vroom Vroom Vroom Vroom is a motorhome and campervan hire comparison website that compares deals across carefully handpicked RV su...
• Campanda Founded in 2013 and headquartered in Berlin, Campanada brings together RV rental companies and private owners with prospecti...

Travel With Pets

Don’t let your favorite furball hold you back, find ways to travel with them

• BringFido BringFido is one of the world’s leading pet travel and lifestyle platforms that connects millions of pet owners with more th...
• Pet Travel Pet Travel is an online resource providing information for pet owners on everything from airline policies to acquiring a pet...
• TrustedHousesitters.com First launched in 2010, TrustedHousesitters.
• GoPetFriendly.com Being the proud owner of a dog is not always easy when on move, with many places unfortunately not welcoming canines the sam...
• Booking.com Pet Friendly Hotels When it comes to finding accommodation in a city you’ve never been to before, Booking.co
• Expedia Pet Friendly Hotels Although most well known as a website for booking flights, Expedia also offers an easy to use interface for finding and rese...

Travel Books

Lose yourself and get inspired by delving into a travel book

• Lost Art of Reading Nature The Lost Art of Reading Nature’s Signs is a guide book written by British naturalist Tristan Gooley whose aim is to encourag...
• Grandma Gatewood's Walk Grandma Gatewood’s Walk follows the story of Emma Gatewood, a 67-year old grandmother who, in 1955, left her small Ohio home...
• Awol on Appalachian Trail AWOL on the Appalachian Trail is the story of David Miller, a software engineer who left his job, family and friends to foll...
• Large Scale Road Atlas The 2019 Rand McNally Large Scale Road Atlas is a spiral-bound atlas containing maps of every US state and over 350 detailed...
• Walt Disney's Disneyland Chris Nichols’ Walt Disney’s Disneyland is a book that celebrates the history and cultural phenomenon of one of the United S...
• Love Affair Five Continents Wanderlust: A Love Affair with Five Continents is an autobiography written by Elisabeth Eaves, chronicling her travels abroa...

Travel Network Sites

Link up with fellow travelers and locals with the best online networks

• Trover Trover is a travel website and smartphone application that allows its community of users to share photos and tips dedicated ...
• Gap Year Gap Year is a social network and travel advice website committed to providing users with helpful information on taking a gap year.

Review: InterNations

What is internations who founded internations.

• Touristlink Touristlink is an online platform that connects travellers with locals and fellow travellers in over 200 countries worldwide.

Weather Sites

Avoid getting caught in the rain by knowing the weather wherever you go

• weather.com Knowing the weather while travelling is an essential part of planning any trip and, therefore, having a good website where y...
• Weather Underground Since its creation in 1993, Weather Underground has been challenging the conventional way of informing the public about weat...
• Accuweather.com Accuweather.com is a simple weather forecast and news website that provides the latest information on what the climate is do...
• Yahoo Weather Like most search engines, like Google and Bing, Yahoo offers its own weather forecast feature that allows users to search ac...

Travel Finance Sites

Send money and work out budgets

• CurrencyFair CurrencyFair is an online peer-to-peer currency exchange marketplace that provides international transfers in 18 countries w...
• TransferWise Launched in January 2011, TransferWise is an online service for sending money across borders.

Travel Sites – Best Travel Sites List of 2024 for Cheap Vacations!

Welcome to TravelSites.com: your gateway to the world. Whether you are deciding on where you want to go to begin with or you need to find the place places to stay once you get there, TravelSites is your ultimate resource for making travel plans. With hundreds of the best travel websites listed all in one convenient location, never again will you have to wonder if you are finding the best deals on travel sites for flights, travel sites for rental cars, or travel sites for hotels … You will find nothing but the best travel sites here.

What is TravelSites.com, and what makes it the best travel site in the world? 🏆💯🥇🌟

Think about the last time you planned a trip. How many hours did you spend searching on Google or Yahoo for travel sites, cross-referencing countless search results, and trying to figure out whether to rely on Expedia or Priceline for booking the cheapest flights ? How many different travel websites did you visit when searching for the best hotel deals? What about when it came time to find a rental car? I have some good news for you: planning a vacation doesn’t need to be stressful.

I have had a severe case of wanderlust for as long as I can remember. I could never stay in one place for too long. There is just so much world out there that I need to explore, experiences that must be had! Therefore, I have always prioritized travel as much as I am physically (and fiscally) able.

Eventually, though, it occurred to me that juggling all of these travel sites — constantly clicking back and forth between Expedia, Priceline, and countless other travel sites that promised the best deals on flights, car rentals, hotels, vacation packages, and more — was sapping the fun out of the planning process.

Maybe I’m alone in thinking this, but I believe that planning a vacation should be part of the fun, not just a stressful necessity. It should be exciting … each piece of the puzzle snapping into place and bringing you one step closer to your next big trip!

So, I created TravelSites.com. At first, it started as an index of the best travel sites resources, just for my own purposes. As my travel sites list grew, though, I began to realize that there are probably thousands of other travelers just like me who would love a convenient and user-friendly site to help them find the best travel packages, hotels, flights, car rentals, and everything else needed when it comes time to book a trip.

Then I got the idea to make my travel sites list public. However, it didn’t feel like enough to index and list all the world’s best travel websites. If people were going to visit my travel site, I wanted to do more for them … which is when I got the idea to rank, rate, and review each site as well. Now, you can figure out, once and for all, whether Expedia or Priceline is going to be better for your upcoming trip by looking at the specific strengths and weaknesses of each travel site.

If you like what you see, go ahead and add TravelSites.com to your bookmarks … I guarantee this will become your new go-to travel site, that it can unlock all the wonders of the world.

What exactly can you use travel sites for? 💖🔥🚀

TravelSites is your new travel companion. If it is at all related to travel, you will be able to find it here. TravelSites is here to be your digital 21st-century travel agent (minus the fees and the stuffy office). This is the only travel site you’ll ever need when it comes time to start making travel plans.

Let’s say you are looking to find the cheapest direct flights to New York City for New Year’s Eve. Sure, you could Google “direct flights New York City” and then browse the first page of top search results, scrolling through all of the usual suspects. Chances are, you aren’t going to find much outside of the top dogs in the travel industry — you know, Priceline, Expedia, etc. — due to how Google’s algorithm tends to privilege certain sites over others.

How are you supposed to know, then, that you are actually finding the best flight deals on Priceline or Expedia when you browse Google search results? Sure, Expedia is popular and snazzy but does it actually yield the best prices on flights, hotels, and travel packages? Well, not necessarily.

Not to disparage Expedia too much or anything, but finding the best travel sites for booking a flight, hotel, or rental car often depends on the destinations. For instance, some sites are much more effective at hooking you up with international flights than domestic flights. Some of these sites are better for finding last-minute hotel deals, whereas others specialize in helping you find the cheapest car rentals on the market.

At the end of the day, choosing the right site is all about figuring out where each site’s strengths and weaknesses lie and then choosing the right site for the right task. By reading my reviews, you will be given a rare glimpse into the honest and objective pros and cons of all the best travel websites in the world.

Every step in the trip-booking process can be taken here. Maybe you are looking for an interesting international destination, some ideas of where to go. If so, you can always browse my reviews of the best travel photography sites, subreddits, forums, and Instagram travel blogs.

Perhaps you already have a destination in mind, and you want to learn more about all that there is to see and do once you’re there. If so, feel free to browse my travel site lists of the best YouTube travel channels, travel guides, and travel books.

TravelSites also make it easier than ever before for you to take care of business, too, when booking your trip. Find the best deals on direct flights, hotels, rental cars, last-minute travel deals, vacation packages , cruises, homestays, hostels, camping sites, RV rentals, travel insurance, and so much more.

No matter what kind of travel you prefer, TravelSites has you covered. Whether you’re a backpacker looking for trail guides and campsites or you are in search of a luxury vacation package for your honeymoon, you will be able to find what you need here at the best possible price.

What can you find on my best travel site lists, and how did I rank them? 🕵️‍♂️🧠🔗

The only travel websites that you will find on my travel site lists are the best of the best. I do not bother reviewing or rating subpar travel sites. It would be a waste of time for both you and me. Instead, my travel site lists include ratings and in-depth reviews for every one of the best sites for travel on the web.

My reviews are broken into more than 40 individual categories, making it as easy as it should be to track and plan every aspect of your trip. There are travel sites here to use whilst planning your trip while you are on vacation and when you return (should you want to upload photos or discuss your experience on a travel forum).

I ranked these travel sites myself based on consistent criteria. I have tried to devise a system that would make for the most objective evaluation of these travel sites possible. Therefore, I look at every travel site in terms of its user-friendliness, content and features, mobile-friendliness, and pricing.

Whether I am reviewing a site that offers travel plans, travel deals, direct flights, hotels, car rentals, or cruise vacation packages, you can rest assured that I have not judged them arbitrarily — I have used every one of these services personally. I have ranked them according to their performance in each of these areas.

Travel sites that have potential, or stopped operating with their travel services can be found here in the “ Travel Hall of Fame “.

Who can use TravelSites.com? 👨‍👨‍👧‍👦👩‍👩‍👧‍👦👨‍👩‍👧‍👦🧛‍♂️👨‍✈️👰🎅🤴👸

I tried my best to make TravelSites.com as accessible as possible for travelers from all walks of life. Whether your grandparents need to find the cheapest flights home from Florida or your parents are searching for the swankiest luxury vacation packages the web has to offer, send them the link to TravelSites.com and let them explore their travel sites options with ease.

One of my utmost priorities when making this travel site — in addition to, of course, helping people save money on vacation options and deals — was to make it as user-friendly as possible. This is why I have employed the most intuitive travel website design. I wanted this travel site to simplify booking flights and hotels, of taking advantage of the best deals and options available.

I didn’t just make TravelSites with our parents and grandparents in mind, though. I want this travel site to be useful to the most adventurous backpacker and the casual daytripper alike. Whether you want to hike the Annapurna Circuit or find a chill little villa in Costa Rica where you can sit poolside drinking Pina Coladas all day, TravelSites.com is here to help.

Everybody should be able to see the world. Regardless of your age, background, or how much money you make. My dream is to make traveling more widely accessible, a possibility for everyone. TravelSites.com is my humble means of attempting to make that dream a reality.

In short, TravelSites is made to be the perfect travel companion for anyone. As long as you have an internet connection and a desire to see the world, TravelSites is here to help you make it happen.

Why was TravelSites created? 🤔🌴

In my early days as a traveler, I was an energetic young backpacker. The adventure was my M.O. Throw me into a foreign country with a pair of hiking boots and a pack of supplies, and I would immediately get down to exploring the local treasures, stumbling upon whatever happened into my path. Ah, to be young again … Everything was a rush; everything felt like kismet.

As I got older, though, and became a more experienced traveler, I found myself turning to the internet more and more to help me get the most out of my excursions. I found that planning my trips ahead of time frequently led to money saved and time better spent (surprise, surprise!). Eventually, I found myself wasting so many unnecessary hours with dozens of tabs open, comparing and contrasting various rental car services, hotel booking sites , various flight deals, etc. It was frustrating, annoying, and exhausting. It sapped all the fun out of planning a trip to my destination of choice!

I assumed that I was not alone in my frustration. Why couldn’t it be easier to pick the perfect destination? Why couldn’t booking a rental car on the cheap just be simple? Why did booking flights and hotel accommodations equate to hours lost scouring hundreds of Google results? I knew then that there had to be a better way.

Alas, the TravelSites.com that you see today is the site that I’d always wished existed. TravelSites was created in hopes of providing my fellow travelers with an easy way to search and compare all of the greatest travel resources, information, and content to be found on the internet. TravelSites is about convenience, value, options, and deals.

I made TravelSites because I knew that the journey was every bit as important as the destination itself. I sincerely hope that my lists and reviews can help you to optimize your plans and enjoy as much of this wonderful miracle of a world as possible.

Has the Covid 19 pandemic made you anxious to travel? If so, maybe TravelSites can be of assistance. 🎃🧚‍♂️

Naturally, Covid 19 has made the idea of international flights nightmarish (if not impossible in many cases). If you are nervous about taking a trip during these trying times, I can’t say that I blame you. I, for one, have limited my own traveling to only the essentials. That being said, things do happen. Booking flights at the time of Covid 19 is sometimes unavoidable.

Plus, let’s face it, flight prices are unprecedentedly low right now. If you have been waiting around for flights to get cheap before taking that big trip, now could be the time. To be clear, I am not advocating travel for pleasure to an international destination during the Covid 19 pandemic. I am not saying that it is a prudent decision … I am, however, realistically acknowledging the fact that it is happening and that it is partially due to the great value of low price flights right now.

If you must go to international destinations during this Covid 19 pandemic, I ask that you try your best to go about it responsibly. Obviously, if you or someone close to you is experiencing Covid 19 symptoms, please quarantine accordingly. It would also help to familiarize yourself with the CDC guidelines on international travel. For all information on travel health resources, please consult my list of travel sites in the category of Travel Health Info Sites, or read the daily updated travel blog post about Everything You Need to Know About Traveling During COVID-19 .

For more up-to-date and current takes on traveling during these crazy times, you can always check back in on my overseas adventure travel blog   📰 … I update it regularly with plenty of realistic destination options, ideas for vacations, lists of great locations, and tips for travelers during this trying time. I try to add a new post to my overseas adventure travel blog every week — I truly hope that you will find it to be filled with great ideas and suggestions both during these uncertain times and beyond.

You can also use TravelSites right now to plan ahead. Sometimes the best way to get through the darkness of the moment is to keep your eye on the light ahead. You may not be taking many vacations in the next couple of months, sure … but that doesn’t mean that you can’t compare rates, entertain destinations, check out travel deals, and search for flights for closer to next year! If you feel trapped or claustrophobic during quarantine, simply conducting a search for vacation options, cities to go to, comparing prices, and entertaining plans can be freeing.

What are the Top 10 Questions and Answers every Traveler should ask before going on trip? 🤔🤔

Where am i going, and what are the top attractions in the area.

Before traveling, it is important to have a clear understanding of where you are going and what are the top attractions in that area. This will help you plan your itinerary and make the most out of your trip. Researching about the popular tourist spots, local festivals, and cultural activities can help you explore the area more efficiently and make informed decisions about where to stay, what to eat, and what activities to do.

What is the best time of year to travel to this destination?

Knowing the best time of year to travel to your destination can make a significant impact on your travel experience. Some destinations are best to visit during the off-season when crowds are fewer, and prices are cheaper, while others are best visited during peak seasons when the weather is optimal and special events are taking place. Researching about weather conditions, seasonal festivals, and other events can help you plan your trip accordingly.

What are the local customs and cultural norms I should be aware of?

Being aware of local customs and cultural norms is crucial to ensure that you do not offend the locals or get into trouble while traveling. It is important to research and learn about the customs, dress codes, and social behaviors in the area you plan to visit. This can help you respect the local culture and make a good impression while also enjoying the unique experiences that the destination has to offer.

What is the local currency, and where can I exchange my money?

Knowing the local currency and how to exchange your money is important for budgeting and managing your expenses while traveling. Researching about the local currency, exchange rates, and where to find money exchange services can help you avoid unnecessary fees and ensure that you have enough cash to cover your expenses.

What are the local transportation options, and how can I navigate them?

Understanding the local transportation options and how to navigate them can help you get around the destination more efficiently and cost-effectively. Researching about the availability and pricing of public transportation, ride-sharing services, and taxi services can help you plan your travel route and budget accordingly.

Where are the best places to eat and drink in the area?

Exploring the local food scene can be a significant part of your travel experience. Researching about the best places to eat and drink can help you sample the local cuisine, try new foods, and enjoy the local flavors while also avoiding any food-related issues.

What are the safety concerns in this area, and how can I stay safe?

Safety is a critical concern for any traveler. Researching about the potential safety concerns, such as crime rates, natural disasters, or health hazards, and taking necessary precautions can help you stay safe and enjoy your trip without any unnecessary risks.

What are the visa requirements for traveling to this destination?

Visa requirements and other travel regulations vary from country to country. Researching about the visa requirements, processing time, and other travel regulations can help you prepare your travel documents and avoid any last-minute issues.

What should I pack for my trip, and what items are prohibited in this area?

Knowing what to pack for your trip and what items are prohibited in the area can help you avoid any unnecessary hassle at the airport or during your trip. Researching about the weather conditions, cultural norms, and transportation restrictions can help you pack accordingly and avoid any prohibited items.

What are the emergency contact numbers in case of any issues during my trip?

Knowing the emergency contact numbers in case of any issues during your trip can be crucial for your safety and well-being. Researching about the local emergency services, including police, ambulance, and fire department, can help.

How much does TravelSites cost? 🤶🎅🆓🔝

Traveling is seldom cheap. Even after you use my travel site to compare all of your options and get the best rates on hotels, airfare, rental cars, and everything else, every additional dollar spent counts. That is why TravelSites is 100% free for everyone to use. I would never have it any other way.

You don’t even need so much as an email address to take advantage of the awesome offers and savings to be found here. Once again, anyone with an internet connection and a desire to see the world can search and discover the great value of TravelSites right now. This site is about nothing more than encouraging adventure and cultural curiosity.

Not only is Travel Sites a free resource for travelers, but it is also free of advertisements. When your goal is to provide the most objective and comprehensive list of sites related to wanderlust, incorporating ads, I think, would result in a conflict of interest. I don’t want visitors to feel swayed to one destination (country or city) over another.

Nor would I want to sully the objectivity of my reviews by allowing a specific travel site to advertise its services, creating the false impression that it is somehow better than the rest. I want this travel website to be something of a free and open terrain for you to explore on your own accord.

My goal is to provide you with the greatest resource of vacation options, offers, plans, destinations, prices, ideas, and apps, and I do not believe that this should cost you a cent. Save that money for your next excursion. I don’t want your money. I suppose if our paths ever cross on our travels, I’d let you buy me a beer, though!

Okay, but are the sites that are featured in your lists free to use? 🧾📝

Well, that depends on travel sites. Once again, I only link to the best of the best resources. Some of them are absolutely free. Others offer subscription-based services. Some have associated surcharges for the services that they provide. The prices are bound to vary greatly.

It will be up to you, ultimately, to decide on which travel websites are worth their associated prices (if they have one). I offer a whole travel sites list, for instance, of language learning tools. Some of these services, naturally, offer premium subscriptions. I mean, hey, learning a language is never free (unless, of course, you simply immerse yourself in a foreign city and converse until you catch on).

At the end of the day, though, once you become accustomed to TravelSites, I am completely confident that, even with certain services having various prices attached to them, you will end up being able to save money here. That is part of why I do this, to begin with! Because I want to make it as easy as possible for you to search for the best rates available. I want to make traveling as simple and affordable as it can be.

How do I contact you if I have a question? 💡📞📧

We travelers need to stick together! I absolutely love hearing from anyone and everyone who also suffers from wanderlust. Whether you have a question about TravelSites, you have a great travel resource to share that is glaringly missing from any of my travel sites list, or you just want to share a story or two of your travels, please do not hesitate to reach out!

I can be reached via email 📩, Skype,  Facebook Messenger 📝 , Twitter , or  Linkedin .

You can find everything about my travel sites here on the about travel sites page 🔗

Also, you can check me on my travel sites author page profile: David  🧔

I look forward to hearing from you, and wish you happy travels! 🥰

Should I book a cruise online? Here's what to know.

• Travelers can book cruises online through the cruise line or third-party sites.
• Booking online offers convenience, but there can be some drawbacks.
• Travelers who need help with their booking may have to contact the cruise line or third-party site.

Travelers can buy almost anything they need for a cruise online, from flip-flops to sunscreen to the trip itself.

Many travelers book cruises through travel agents, but that’s not necessarily the right move for everyone. “Some people don't want to deal with people,” said Joanna Kuther, a New York City-based travel agent and owner of Port Side Travel Consultants. “They want to go online. They don't want to have one conversation.”

But with seemingly endless search results and websites vying for prospective guests’ attention in ads, the experience can be overwhelming. And while booking online offers convenience, there can be some drawbacks. 

What are the best websites to book a cruise online?

When booking online, Kuther recommended going directly through the cruise line – if you know which one you want to sail with.

Travelers can easily browse itineraries, the line’s ships and their layouts, and other add-ons and promotions offered. If customers reserve other aspects of their trip, like flights, directly through the line, they will also have greater protection in the event of disruptions.

Cruise booking tips: There's more to it than picking your travel dates

“So if there's a cancellation or a delay, it's their job to get you to that ship,” Kuther said. “That's their commitment.” However, she noted that travelers may not have as many choices as when booking their flights themselves. (Cruise lines often have in-house vacation planners who are familiar with the brand.)

Travelers can book cruises via third-party sites as well and may be able to find deals doing so. Booking.com introduced a cruise option late last year, allowing travelers to book sailings, flights and hotels in one place. Other sites like Expedia and Orbitz also offer the category, and there are cruise-specific sites as well like Cruisebound.com and Cruise.com.

Those can also offer a comprehensive way to see what cruises are out there. Brandon O. Smith, who runs the YouTube channel The Weekend Cruiser , said Vacations To Go’s search function is particularly good. Many travelers also like Costco Travel because it’s “kind of built into their ecosystem,” he added.

Travelers booking through online travel agencies may have to pay fees that cruise lines do not charge, however, Smith said.

What if I need help with my booking?

Customers who book online on their own may have to contact the cruise line or third-party site when they have questions or issues, and the customer representative’s familiarity with the kind of trip they’re taking might vary. “And I think that's one of the big shortcomings,” Smith said.

Some travelers who have used third-party booking sites have had to jump through hoops to get help when their plans have gone awry.

Should first-time cruisers book a cruise online?

There is a wide range of lines and ships that cater to different types of vacations.

( click here for USA TODAY’s cruise line guide).

Smith recommended new cruisers work with a travel agent who can help them determine what kind of voyage is right for them. “Word of mouth is a great way to find people, and finding people who know your style of cruising,” he said. “So, if you're a family of five, you want to find somebody that's familiar with looking for larger families.”

If a traveler is looking for highly personalized advice, he said, “You're not going to get that through an online booking tool.”

Nathan Diller is a consumer travel reporter for USA TODAY based in Nashville. You can reach him at [email protected].

The Key Points at the top of this article were created with the assistance of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and reviewed by a journalist before publication. No other parts of the article were generated using AI. Learn more .

24 Best Travel Websites and Apps to Find Deals and Save You Money

Use our guide to the best travel websites and find discounts and deals so you can vacation without breaking the bank.

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Whether you’re looking for a cheap last-minute vacation or planning to go home for the holidays, you’ll want to know the best travel websites to use. And if you’re tired of wondering which sites are best for each part of your trip planning, we’ve got you covered. 

Here are some of the best travel sites we’ve found to help you bag bargains on airfares, lodging, car rentals and all your other travel needs. Best of all, almost all of the travel websites are free to use. Bon voyage! 

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Best websites to save on airfare

Keeping up with airfare prices has gotten easier thanks to sites like Google Flights and Kayak . To use them, just type in your home and destination airport, pick the flights that work best for you and then set an alert to track the price. For example, Google Flights will send you an e-mail showing if your tracked flight went up or down in price. Both sites also let you see which days are cheaper to fly in that month. Airfarewatchdog also lets you search flight deals.

If you haven’t decided on where exactly you want to go,  sign up for Going (formerly known as Scott’s Cheap Flights.) Their newsletter comes straight to your inbox with deals on domestic and international locations. Or you can follow Twitter handles such as @TheFlightDeal for flights, too.

Sponsored Content

Best websites for flight information

Once your flight is booked, you’ll want to keep tabs on gate changes, layover information and more. FlightStats.com can help you plan a smooth trip by advising you on the best time of day to fly from a specific airport and which terminals to avoid when connecting flights. You can also view live updates of flight delays and sign up for free e-mail and phone alerts. Flightaware.com also tracks and predicts flight delays.

If you’re delayed by weather or some unforeseen event, it pays to act quickly. The TripIt Pro smartphone app ($49/year) will send you alerts about cancellations, delays or gate changes, sometimes even ahead of an airline announcement. Use it to locate alternate flights, find out when better seats are available, get fare refund notifications, track your rewards program points, and more.

Best websites to save on hotels

Hotels.com lets you search just one site for accommodations at hundreds of thousands of properties. Plus, its rewards program is simple: For every ten nights you spend at any combination of the program’s 500,000 member properties, you’ll earn a free night’s stay. As a member, you also unlock an average discount of 15% on select hotels. 

Similarly, HotelTonight is an app that lets users book hotels at low last-minute rates. Priceline Express Deals helps you find the best bargains, but there’s a catch. Priceline doesn’t tell you which hotel you’re booking until after you pay.

And try TripAdvisor.com for a detailed list of rated hotels (and excursions) that are close to your destination. The site links you to partner sites, such as Expedia and Travelocity for fulfillment. Click on the "check rates" button and select the site or sites you’d like to try — a new window with results will open for each partner.

Best websites to save on vacation rentals

Vacation rentals are an especially good value for groups because they generally offer more space and amenities for prices similar to or less than hotel rates, particularly if you look at it on a per-bed basis. Check out VRBO and Airbnb to find the perfect experience. For Marriott loyalists, Marriott Bonvoy lets you browse its 30-brand portfolio — which includes more than 2,000 private homes.

At the other end of the scale, if you don’t mind college-dorm-level amenities, check out Hostelworld.com , as a way to save money on vacation rental properties . The site lists 36,000 properties in 178 countries around the globe and includes reviews.

Best websites for cruises and vacation packages

At CruiseCompete.com , more than 500 travel agencies vie to give you the lowest prices for dates, ports and ships you specify, whether you’re booking well in advance or at the eleventh hour. You set up a CruiseCompete account, and they send you their best offers without ever seeing your personal information.

Kayak.com and Tripadvisor.com will also knit together vacation packages for you. Just type in your destination and travel dates to get the best prices.

Best websites to save on rental cars

Hotwire often offers the best-published deals on cars by collecting rates from its eight rental car company partners, including Alamo, Enterprise and Hertz. The site also offers "hot rates" from rental companies that aren't identified until after you’ve paid.

And while Hotwire does offer some good prepaid rental car deals, in certain international cities for the best overseas auto deals you should check out AutoEurope . It offers rentals at more than 20,000 locations worldwide, and customer service is available 24/7.

AutoSlash is also a good site to find rental deals, as it will apply the best coupons and discount codes to your rental and re-book your reservation if the system finds a better deal.

Best websites to save on international train tickets

Trains are often the fastest and cheapest way to travel within and between European countries. Our favorite for checking timetables and booking tickets on European train lines is RailEurope . But you might be able to catch better deals directly from European railways’ sites if you don’t get lost in translation — and make sure you have what you need to travel to Europe as an American!

Best websites for travel insurance

You never know when an emergency situation will spoil your travel plans. That's what travel insurance is for. But don't just go for the default options from agencies and travel providers. At Squaremouth , you can compare plans and prices from multiple insurance providers with just one search and narrow your search results by specifying the kind of coverage you need. Another option is InsureMyTrip.com .

Rivan joined Kiplinger on Leap Day 2016 as a reporter for Kiplinger's Personal Finance magazine. A Michigan native, she graduated from the University of Michigan in 2014 and from there freelanced as a local copy editor and proofreader, and served as a research assistant to a local Detroit journalist. Her work has been featured in the Ann Arbor Observer and Sage Business Researcher . She is currently assistant editor, personal finance at The Washington Post.

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Travel Checklist

Before packing.

• Start with an EMPTY bag (make sure all pockets and compartments don’t have any items in them)
• 3.4 ounces or less per container
• 1 quart size, clear, plastic, zip top bag (all liquids must fit in bag)
• 1 bag per passenger
•   Review the prohibited items list for both carry-on and checked baggage.
• If purchasing a baggage lock, be sure to look for those that are TSA recognized.
• Tape a card with your name and contact information on your electronics.

When Packing

• Pack items in layers (shoes one layer, clothes one layer, electronics one layer, etc.)
• Firearms are only allowed in checked baggage and must be unloaded, placed in a locked, hard-sided container and declared to your airline.
• All fireworks contain explosive materials and are not permitted in checked or carry-on baggage.
• Do not pack items such as box cutters, utility knives, and razors in carry-on luggage. Razor blades intended for shaving that are enclosed in a safety cartridge in which the blade cannot be removed are permitted.
• Pack large electronics on top layer of carry-on for screening accessibility.
• Place your 3-1-1 bag with liquids, gels and aerosols in the front pocket of your carry-on for accessibility.
• If traveling with a pet, be sure to bring a leash so carriers can be properly screened.

Before Leaving for the Airport

• Give yourself enough time to arrive at the airport early.
• Wear easily removable shoes.
• Passengers with a disability or medical condition may call ahead to the TSA Cares toll free helpline at (855) 787-2227 .

Before Entering the Checkpoint

• Eligible passengers look for the TSA PreCheck® lane for expedited screening at participating airports.
• Have your  ID and boarding pass out for inspection.

In Standard Screening Lane

• Remove the 3-1-1 liquids bag and place it in the bin.
• Ensure pockets are empty (keys, tissues, currency, wallets, cell phones, etc.) and remove bulky jewelry (valuable items can be placed in carry-on).
• Remove your shoes and place them directly on the X-ray belt.
• Remove personal electronic devices larger than a cell phone from your carry-on bag and place them into a bin with nothing placed on or under them for X-ray screening. (E.g. laptops, tablets, e-readers and handheld game consoles.)
• Remember to check the bins and collect all belongings after going through screening.

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Apply for a new adult passport

You need a passport to travel to most countries outside the U.S. Learn how to apply for a passport in person, check your application status, and get it changed or corrected.

Eligibility to get a passport

If you are not able to renew your U.S. passport , or if this is your first one, you will need to apply for a new passport. To be eligible, you must be either:

• A U.S. citizen by birth or naturalization or
• A qualifying U.S. non-citizen national

You must apply in person at a passport acceptance facility for a new passport. It cannot be done online or by mail.

What do you need to get a passport?

The application process for passport books and passport cards is the same. You will choose which type of passport you want when you fill out the application. Learn about the differences between passport books and passport cards.

There are 4 things you will need to apply for and get your U.S. passport.

• You can Fill out Form DS-11 online and print it, or 
• Download Form DS-11 [PDF, 5 pages, 1.9 MB] and fill it out by hand, or
• Find your local passport acceptance facility or regional agency and pick up Form DS-11.
• Do not sign Form DS-11 until you are at your appointment and the passport acceptance official tells you to do so. 
• Original proof of citizenship - Learn about what qualifies as primary citizenship evidence or what secondary evidence may qualify if you do not have primary evidence.
• An acceptable photo ID
• A photocopy of both your citizenship document and photo ID
• Passport photo
• Passport fee

Apply in person. Find your local passport acceptance facility. This facility could be a library or post office. Some facilities require appointments or have limited hours.

If you need your passport quickly

Learn how and where to get your passport fast for emergency or urgent travel or to get expedited processing. The time it takes for each varies throughout the year, and there may be additional fees. Use the fee calculator or chart.

Check the status of your passport application

Follow the steps from the Department of State to  check the status of your passport application online .

If you need to change your name or correct your new passport

After you receive your passport, if you change your name or find an error, you will need to get an updated passport to reflect the change. The process, cost, and forms you need depend on how long you have had your passport. Follow the steps from the State Department to change your name or correct your passport.

If you are outside the U.S.

Contact the U.S. embassy or consulate near you to request a passport while outside the U.S.

If you need help with your passport application

If you have questions about your U.S. passport, the National Passport Information Center (NPIC) can help. Get contact information for NPIC , and find out when to contact them based on when you are traveling.

LAST UPDATED: May 14, 2024

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Apply for your First Adult Passport

Apply for a Child Under 16

Apply as a 16 or 17 Year Old

Get My Application Status

Get a Passport Card

Respond to a Letter or Email

• Both parents or guardians must approve that we can issue a passport to a child, and go with the child to apply in person.
• If one or both parents or guardians cannot apply with their child, you will need to show us more documents.
• You cannot renew your child's passport using Form DS-82.
• Passports for children under age 16 are only valid for 5 years. 

Steps to Apply

1. fill out form ds-11 and print it.

Use our Form Filler tool  to fill out your child's form on a desktop or laptop computer and then print it. If you are experiencing technical issues with the Form Filler, download a PDF . 

Tips to complete your child's form :

• Do not sign your child's form until asked to do so by a passport acceptance agent or employee. 
• You can apply for a passport book , a passport card , or both documents.
• You may ask for a larger passport book with more visa pages, at no extra cost, by checking the 'large book' box at the top of the DS-11.

2. Get Evidence of U.S. Citizenship (and a photocopy)

Your evidence must be an original or replacement copy. The document must have the official seal or stamp of the office which issued it. You must submit one of the following documents for your child:

• Issued by the city, county, or state of birth
• Lists applicant's full name, date of birth, and place of birth
• Lists the parent(s)' full names
• Has the date filed with registrar's office (must be within one year of birth)
• Has the registrar's signature
• Has the seal or stamp of the city, county, or state which issued it
• Consular Report of Birth Abroad or Certification of Birth
• Certificate of Citizenship
• Please note you must also provide a document, such as a birth certificate, that lists the parent(s) or legal guardian(s) of the child. Full validity means the document is or was valid for 10 years for adults and 5 years for children under 16. 

If you cannot submit one of these documents, go to our  Citizenship Evidence page  for more information.

Paper only : You cannot submit digital evidence of U.S. citizenship such as a mobile or electronic birth certificate. You must submit physical evidence of U.S. citizenship and a photocopy of the document. 

Returning your child's document : We will return your child's document in a separate mailing up to 8 weeks after you receive the new passport.

Tips for making a photocopy :

• Black and white (no color)
• Use 8.5 inch by 11 inch paper
• Use a single side of the paper

If you do not submit a photocopy, you must submit a second copy of your citizenship evidence. We will keep this copy for our records.

3. Show Your Relationship to Your Child

You must submit a document that lists the parent(s) or legal guardian(s) of the child. Examples include:

• U.S. birth certificate (also evidence of U.S. citizenship)
• Foreign birth certificate
• Adoption decree
• Divorce or custody decree
• A court order

Some documents, like a U.S. birth certificate, show  both  U.S. citizenship and parental relationship. These documents must be originals or certified copies (not photocopies).

You and your child may have different last names, as long as the document showing your relationship to your child lists your full name.

If your name is different than the one on the document showing your relationship to your child, submit proof of your legal name change.

4. Get a Photo ID (and a photocopy)

Both parents or guardians must bring a physical, photo ID and a photocopy of it. If your photo ID is from a different state than the state in which you are applying, bring a second photo ID. 

You must show at least  one  of these photo IDs:

• Valid or expired, undamaged U.S. passport book or passport card 
• In-state, fully valid driver's license or enhanced driver's license with photo
• Certificate of Naturalization 
• Certificate of Citizenship 
• Government employee ID (city, county, state, or federal)
• U.S. military or military dependent ID
• Current (valid) foreign passport
• Matricula Consular (Mexican Consular ID) used by a parent of a U.S. citizen child applicant
• U.S. Permanent Resident Card (Green Card) used by a parent of a U.S. citizen child applicant
• Trusted Traveler IDs (including valid Global Entry, FAST, SENTRI, and NEXUS cards)
• Enhanced Tribal Cards and Native American tribal photo IDs
• In-state, fully-valid learner's permit with photo
• In-state, fully-valid non-driver ID with photo
• Temporary driver's license with photo

If you do not have one of these photo IDs, go to our  Identification page  for more information.

5. Show More Documents (if both parents or guardians cannot apply)

• Both parents or guardians must approve that we can issue a passport to a child, and go with the child to apply in person.
• If one or both parents or guardians cannot apply in person with their child, you will need to show more documents.

Important : Submit  Form DS-3053  and other notarized statements within three months of signing them.

6. Provide a Photo

You must provide one photo with your child's application. Go to our  Passport Photo page  for photo requirements and to see examples of photos. 

• Do not attach or staple your child's photo to the form. The acceptance agent or passport employee will review the photo and staple it to your form.
• Some  passport acceptance facilities
• A company which offers photo services
• Home. Ask your friend or family member to take your child's photo. Print it on glossy or matte photo quality paper. 

7. Calculate Fees

When applying using Form DS-11, you will pay two separate fees - an application fee and an execution (acceptance) fee. You will pay the application fee to the U.S. Department of State, and the execution (acceptance) fee to the facility which takes your application. 

• Add $60 to your application fee if you want  expedited service .
• Add $19.53 to your application fee if you want us to ship your completed passport in 1-2 days after we issue it.  

Child Applicants :

For more information on how to pay and a full list of fees, go to our  Passport Fees  page.

*How to fill out your check and pay the application fee to the U.S. Department of State. Please note you must pay a separate execution (acceptance) fee. 

Families may write one check or money order to the U.S. Department of State if they are applying at the same time. The check or money order must include the name and date of birth of each applicant.

8. Find Location to Apply

In the United States:

• Traveling in more than 3 weeks?  Go to a  passport acceptance facility  such as a post office, library, or local government office. Check with the facility to see if you need to make an appointment. 
• Traveling in less than 3 weeks?   Make an appointment  to apply at a passport agency or center.

In another country:

• Contact your  U.S. embassy or consulate .

9. Track Your Application Status

You can  subscribe to email updates  about your application status, and  learn more about each status update .

It may take 2 weeks from the day you apply until your child's application status is “In Process.” 

Frequently Asked Questions

How will you send my child's passport and supporting documents.

You will get multiple mailings. The number of mailings depends on what document(s) you asked for.

Passport Book : You may get your new passport and citizenship documents in two mailings. You may wait 8 weeks after getting your passport before you get a second mailing with your citizenship documents. We will return the passport book using a trackable delivery service.

Passport Card : You may get your new passport card and your citizenship documents in two mailings. You may wait 8 weeks after getting your passport before you get a second mailing with your citizenship documents. We only send the passport card via First Class Mail. We do not send cards using 1-2 day delivery services.

Both a Passport Book and Card : You may get three separate mailings:

• New passport book
• New passport card
• Citizenship documents

Contacting Us : If you have been waiting more than 8 weeks for your documents, call us at  1-877-487-2778  to report that you have not received your documents. 

If you want us to reimburse you for a lost supporting document, you must contact us within 90 days of the date which we mailed your passport. You will also need to provide a receipt to show the cost of replacing the document. 

Can I pay for faster delivery and return shipping?

Yes. You may choose one or both of the following shipment options:

• Delivering application to us : Pay for Priority Mail Express for faster shipping. The price for this service varies depending on the area of the country.
• Returning the passport to you : Pay $19.53 for 1-2 day delivery. This means you will receive your passport   1-2 days after we send it. Include this fee with your check or money order payable to the U.S. Department of State. Do not submit a return envelope to us with postage pre-paid. 

You may receive your passport and supporting documents in separate mailings. If you are renewing a passport card, we will send it to you via First Class Mail. We do not use 1-2 day delivery services if you only applied for a passport card.

What countries require Form DS-3053 "Statement of Consent" to be notarized at an embassy or consulate?

In certain countries, a DS-3053 must be notarized at a  U.S. embassy or consulate  and cannot be notarized by a local notary public. Currently, these countries include:

Special Passport Fairs

Find a Special Passport Fair  near you!

We're holding special passport fairs all across the United States to help you get your passport more easily. New events are added to our site every week.

Most events are for first-time applicants and children, (who use Form DS-11). If you can use Form DS-82, you can renew by mail at your convenience!

Processing Times

Routine:  6-8 weeks*

Expedited: 2-3 weeks and an extra $60*

*Consider the total time it will take to get a passport when you are booking travel.  Processing times only include the time your application is at a passport agency or center.

• It may take up to 2 weeks for applications to arrive at a passport agency or center. It may take up to 2 weeks for you to receive a completed passport after we print it. 
• Processing times + mailing times = total time to get a passport

Urgent Travel:  See our Get my Passport Fast page. 

How to Apply for your Child's Passport

Watch this video to learn how to apply in person for your child's U.S. passport!

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