I once heard in Norway that there’s no such thing as bad weather, just bad…
How to Better Travel with Your Phone
You know what’s crazy? Not that long ago, we barely used our phones when traveling! If I told myself back in, let’s say 2010, about international eSIMs or Pinterest or the fact that half the time my plane tickets are a QR code in my phone, she’d look at me like I’d grown ten heads. In fact, she’d probably ask why I’m trying to connect to the internet on my phone, and why I’m not worried about accidentally getting charged hundreds of dollars.
These days, no one I know travels without their phone. And with how advanced technology has become, it’s easier and more convenient than ever to stay connected and rely on our phones for everything from navigation to communication to entertainment!
I will say when traveling, it’s important to find a balance between relying on your phone for convenience and becoming so reliant, you miss out on what’s happening around you.
With that in mind, here are my tips for how to better travel with your phone.
How to Better Travel with Your Phone
Before You Leave, Do a General Maintenance Check
I firmly believe your phone should be a source of help, not frustration, especially when going on a trip. Do you really want to be standing in front of a World Wonder and struggling with some tech issue on your phone? No!
These are just some things to check in on:
- Battery Life – Phone batteries do tend to deteriorate over time, and if you always find yourself on low battery or needing to plug in, consider getting the battery updated before you go. The process usually takes a few hours at most! I also bring a portable charger with me just in case.
- Fix the Screen – If your phone has a bunch of cracks, now is a good time to get it fixed (and also to invest in a good screen cover). Just always good to keep it protected from the elements. Nothing is worse than getting a cracked phone wet and breaking it!
- Clean Up Storage – Imagine you’re out taking photos or videos, and all of a sudden you can’t take any more because your storage is full! It’s always good to make sure you have enough GB of storage to last through vacation. Delete or offload apps you don’t need, clear caches, see if you can delete old photos and videos… You may also want to invest in some cloud storage like Dropbox or iCloud.
Turn Off Notifications!!!
When on your trip, turn off every single notification you can, especially if you’re going on vacation. You do NOT need to get push notifications on every email that comes into your inbox, nor do you need to know about most text messages, app updates, or whatever else you normally get notified of in your day-to-day.
At the very least, I like to keep my phone on permanent Do Not Disturb mode so I can somewhat control when I want to go through my notifications. Travel is about getting away from your normal life; don’t get bogged down in things that can wait!
Know What the Best Navigation/Transport Apps to Use Are
I swear, just about every country is slightly different in how they approach navigation! You may want to download these alternative apps to get around more easily and accurately. For example:
- Map Apps – Google or Apple are standard, but there’s also Maps.me, CityMapper, Waze, and AllTrails. When we were in China and Korea, they also had their own map apps that worked significantly better!
- Transport Apps – If you plan on using public transport, your best bet is to download the local transport app to keep track of schedules and real-time arrivals/departures.
- Rideshare Apps – Uber and Lyft work most places, but did you know many countries in Asia use Grab? And when we were in Italy, FreeNow worked best.
Just always good to double-check what’s used the most where you’re going. And, as an added bonus: download whatever app your airline uses! It’s easier to track your flight and usually has a few extra bells and whistles that don’t show up in email or on the normal website.
Download What You Can Offline
You’d be surprised by how much you can save offline for those long plane rides or to use as little of your international phone plan as possible. Just a quick list:
- Most map apps
- Kindle/reading apps
- Spotify/Apple Music apps
- Most streaming apps
- Translation apps (make sure you download individual languages you need)
- Google drive docs/sheets
- Tickets (most can be added to your virtual wallet)
Commit to a Messaging App That EVERYONE Can Use
These days, there are about a million ways to message anyone in the world at any time, and they’re all more reliable than iMessage! Not only will iMessage not work with non-iPhone users, but it also often gets funky if you use a different SIM card or keep your phone on airplane mode. I can’t tell you how many times some messages will randomly not get sent because something switched in iMessage without us realizing. (Ever get an email address instead of the person’s name?)
WhatsApp, Signal, Facebook Messenger (which you can use without having the Facebook app downloaded), KakaoTalk, WeChat, Instagram DMs … that’s just to name a few. If you’re on a group trip or know there are people in your life at home you want to keep in touch with regularly (like your parents or pet sitter), organize an app you can all use reliably.
Limit Your Social Media Usage.
Social media can sometimes be one of the best resources when traveling, and other times it can be the absolute worst. There are some trips where I truly think it’s worth it to just completely delete every single app from Instagram to Reddit to Pinterest off your phone and disconnect, but I also know that’s just not totally doable all the time. Here are some best practices:
- Keep notifications off – For all the reasons I listed above. I’d also go a step further and completely turn off those red dot notifications, too.
- When using for recommendations – If you love checking Instagram or Pinterest to help with trip planning, I recommend jotting down the places or tips in your notes app so you’re not tempted to go back into the app to re-find the post.
- For communication – Try to keep important communications off a social media app and on a regular messaging app.
- Sharing your trip – As a general safety rule, I strongly recommend NOT sharing your trip until after you’re back or you’ve left the destination.
- Minimizing time on the apps – If you’re the type of person who really struggles to disengage from social media, look for other ways to minimize its appeal. There are different apps and programs that help with this. One of my crew members uses an app that makes his whole phone gray scale so it’s less appealing to scroll through! I’ve also heard of people downloading programs to block them for certain apps if they go over a preset time limit.
Take Better Photos and Videos
The photographers on my team are shaking their heads, but for the most part, you can get very nice photos and videos of your trip just using your phone. Whether it’s using the default camera app or downloading a different app (like Blackmagic for videos and NOMO RAW for better raw photography), phones have come a long way from the fuzzy pics a flip phone could capture.
The key, though, is learning how to take those photos or videos. Some quick tips:
- Turn off the HDR on your phone!!!!
- Clean off the lens before you take your photo. You’d be surprised by how much of a difference this can make!
- Don’t shoot with the light in the back. That’s how you get weird lighting and fading in the foreground.
- Shoot straight on. Going too high or too low distorts the subject.
- If you use an iPhone, I know the grid is right there on the camera. Use it! It helps with taking a straight shot or making sure your subject is in the center.
- Play around with the exposure/lighting. On an iPhone, if you tap the subject, you’ll see the little sun icon. Bring it up or down to make the photo brighter or darker. Sometimes, darker makes the image sharper!
Take Advantage of Your Virtual Wallet
While I do find comfort in printing things out, know that you can also really take advantage of using your virtual wallet! I mean, these days we can manage our credit cards, tickets, phone plans, various passes, insurance cards, and more all right in that little wallet app. Crazy!
I promise, the more you get used to using it, the more normal it feels.
Keep Things Simple
For the most part, you really do not need all the fancy apps someone is always trying to sell. Don’t feel like you need to clutter your phone with them. Here are some things you probably don’t need:
- A fancy map app – whichever one works in your destination, just use that.
- A currency converter app – your calculator or a quick Google will do the job
- Fancy notes apps – the regular notes app on your phone will work just fine!
- Flight status apps – they can be helpful, but you really do not need them 99% of the time. You can actually text yourself your flight code and see the information right there.
Do you have any tips on using your phone to travel better? Let me know below!
Comments (23)
Leave a Reply
Related Posts
One application I have on my smart phone that I use consistently is Skype. As I have a Skype phone number associated with my account, my sister, brother or various in-laws are able to reach me or my wife if there is an urgent need when we are out of the country (usually at least once per year).
As a frequent traveler I can’t live without TripIt. It’s a free app that allows you to consolidate all your hotels, flights, car rental info, etc. into one place for easy retrieval. I love how I can forward all my confirmation emails to the app and it automatically adds all the info to my itinerary, and even gives me the forecast and maps to my destination. Plus, there’s a pro option that gives flight statuses and even more. What a time saver.
Love Tripit, plus you don’t need wifi or data to access your itinerary so handy mid-flight or in the back of a taxi.
My husband has a hard time reading me yes is low light so I got a flashlight app. Found it comes in handy for many other times also.
I take my iPad along and load Microsoft’s OneNote on it. There is an iPhone vs but not as easy to read. OneNote is like one big notebook with several tabs where you can save copies of all kinds of useful documents. I use it to keep copies of reservations, etc., and detailed itineraries and things to do and see. Beats carrying around travel guides. Great for off-line maps as well.
Hi Samantha – to add to your great tip on DropBox, it’s also a great way to back-up or save your pictures from your Smartphone. After installing DropBox, just own a picture and “share” to your DropBox. Then, if something happens to your phone or you just need to delete pictures to make room for more, your photos are already saved in the cloud and can be accessed from anywhere on your phone or PC. (Note: this does require a data or Wi-Fi connection.)
Because of my fear of losing connectivity when my boarding pass was on my smartphone app, I started taking a screenshot of it on my phone so I could just pull it up from my Images.
Not exactly an app but I have a Mophie case for my iPhone. It adds another battery that’s 125% as long lasting as the phone’s. Now I never have to hunt for a charger at the airport.
I also use the Garmin Western Europe app on my iPhone for navigation.
I used Evernote while I was traveling through Jamaica to capture notes on the trip that I later used in my blog.
I take a picture of where I parked my car at the airport when I depart. I also take picture of my rental car’s license plate, because I sometimes forget what I’m driving!
That’s brilliant.
I recently received an alert from Lifelock that my personal information was sold on the dark web, and the origin was my Dropbox account. Very leery of using them now!
My friend and I both downloaded into our iPhones, Rick Steve’s audio walking tours of Paris. We both listened to the same tour while in the Louvre, Notre Dame, the Catacombs, etc. and it was like having our own personal tour guide giving us a history lesson while we walked. It made the trip so much more meaningful.
I use the alarm function, of course, but it is also a great night light for getting to and from the bathroom in the middle of the night.
your recommendations are good, I usually go one step further and set up the twitter feeds for the emergency responders at my destination (usually Germany). I worked in the emergency services for 30 years and having one ear to their dispatch gives you the important news first.
For flights without in-flight entertainment, Netflix now has a download option for offline viewing. I just watched the whole first season of the Judd Apatow show “Love.” Spotify’s offline option is a necessity for trips by car. TripSource works well for organizing business trips.
Sam,
For borrowing ebooks and audiobooks from the library, the apps are Overdrive and Hoopla. When the chaos of travel lines pop up, Hoopla has also comedy albums so you’ll be laughing instead of frustrated.
Don’t forget Libby! Although I do tend to use Hoopla the most.
I use almost all of these, and find that during a day of travel it wears down my battery quite fast. I can start the day will a full charge on my iPhone, and with location tracking on, plus taking lots of photos, the battery is almost dead by the afternoon. I now carry a charging cord in my purse to boost the battery during a train ride, boat ride, or lunch in a restaurant. For a recent trip to Europe, I bought (for less than $8 on Amazon) a European USB charger so I didn’t have to carry around a bulky US-to-European adapter.
I used Tripcast with a group of friends. We each posted photos from our smartphones and our families could view our trip. Later we can down our photos. Love this site. Used it on 4 trips.
I always use the Google Maps offline option. You can save an offline map to your phone of an entire city or region, that way if you are somewhere you don’t have wi-fi, or don’t want to use up precious data you can still tell where you are at.
Just came back from a two week cruise and got a $500.00 phone bill for over system use. I wish I had this information before I left. It is still great advice for future trips. Thank you!
Why turn off the HDR on your phone?