Since we are to create a Travel App prototype, I’ve been looking around on the App Store at the different travel apps available in order to find inspiration.

TripIt

The first app I came across was called “TripIt”

Something I really liked about the app icon was how it shows that the app will help you with all different trips, from place A – home (the orange circle), to place B, C, D etc.

This app looks great for planning your trip, and keeping everything in the one place. One of the features I liked most about it was the fact that you can store your travel tickets within the app. This feature makes everything a lot more accessible and convenient. Everyone wants travel to run smoothly, and I like how TripIt took that into consideration.

Another feature that caught my interest was that the app has an interactive map to view your itinerary on, with clickable icons that include details about each of the plans you log. This is something I may consider taking inspiration from with my own travel app prototype.

Tripsy

The next app I came across was “Tripsy”. I liked many elements of this app, so I thought it would be good to look into it a little more.

I liked how the icon is simple and to the point. A travel app with a suitcase icon.

As I said, this app holds many interesting features, and one thing I loved about it was how the layout of your trip looks like a phone homescreen. It has a background matching the destination, and the details of the trip displayed as widgets. I thought this made the app seem very easy to navigate.

Another feature that looked very cool to me was how, if you scroll down on the main page of the app, there is a page called “Get Inspired”, where they display different destinations and trip plans to look into for your next adventure.

I think this feature is really unique, and I love how it is designed – with the main focus being an image of a tourist area from each suggested City.

Mapify

The third app I found was called “Mapify”.

This app wasn’t as focussed on trip planning and organising as the other two I looked at, but it is more focussed on travel inspiration and community. This is something I was thinking of trying to integrate into my travel app seeing as social media is such a large part of modern day life.

I really like the idea of forming a community around travelling, where people can give eachother ideas and speak about the more niche places or landmarks that they may have visited on their travels. I think if I were to include something like this in my app, I would moreso focus on the idea of sharing inspiration, and less on making it seem like social media. The way Mapify was created reminds me somewhat of Instagram, and I think the likes feature may take away from the experience of sharing travels with one another.

However, I do like how it allows you to add friends to a travel plan so everyone can add and share their own ideas to the itinerary, and keep up to date with new plans.

I’m not too sure if I much like the actual design and layout of this app as a whole, but I definitely like the idea of building a somewhat “community” within the app.