Wanderlog and TripIt sit next to each other in every app-store search, but they cover different halves of a trip: Wanderlog helps you build the plan before you book, TripIt keeps what you booked organized once the confirmations start landing. Choosing between them mostly means deciding which half you actually need help with.
Disclosure: MonkeyEatingMango, the tool behind this blog, appears later in this comparison — treat that entry with appropriate skepticism. Wanderlog and TripIt are described from their public pages, verified July 2026.
The gist:
- Wanderlog is a map-first planner. Free tier covers pins, days, collaboration, and manual budgets; Pro is $39.99/yr.
- TripIt is a booking organizer. Forward confirmation emails, get a timeline; Pro is $49/yr and adds real-time flight alerts.
- Neither writes the itinerary for you. Wanderlog Pro's AI suggests places you add yourself; TripIt doesn't plan at all.
- Many travelers run both: plan in Wanderlog, track in TripIt. The free tiers make the combination cheap to test.
Quick answer
| If you want | Pick | Price (July 2026) |
|---|---|---|
| To plan routes and days on a map, with your group editing live | Wanderlog | Free + Pro $39.99/yr |
| Your bookings auto-organized, with flight alerts on the road | TripIt | Free + Pro $49/yr |
| A complete day-by-day itinerary generated for you | MonkeyEatingMango | Free |
Want the first draft written for you instead of built pin by pin? Generate a free itinerary in a few minutes, no signup required →
Side by side
| Wanderlog | TripIt | |
|---|---|---|
| Core job | Plan the trip on a map | Organize booked reservations |
| Builds a day-by-day plan | You build it manually | No |
| Activity suggestions | Yes (free tier) | No |
| Driving times between stops | Yes | No |
| Real-time flight alerts | No | Pro |
| Seat and fare tracking | No | Pro |
| Budget tracking | Manual entry (free) | No |
| Live group editing | Yes | View-only sharing unless both have Pro |
| Documents per trip | n/a | 3 free, 25 on Pro |
| Offline access | Pro | Yes |
| Price | Free + $39.99/yr | Free + $49/yr |
How this comparison was put together
Feature and pricing claims come from each tool's public pricing and feature pages (wanderlog.com/pro, tripit.com/pro), checked July 2026, plus widely reported user feedback where noted. Both products change their tiers periodically, so treat the live pages as the source of truth. No paid placement, no affiliate relationship with either tool.
Wanderlog: the map-first planner
Best if: the planning is the part you need help with, and you want the whole group editing one trip across any device.
Wanderlog starts from a map. You drop places in, drag them into days, and it calculates driving times between stops, which is why it keeps coming up in road-trip threads. Native iOS and Android apps plus a web app mean a mixed-device group can edit the same plan live, on the free tier.
The free tier is unusually generous: unlimited places, collaboration, manual budget tracking, and flight, hotel, and car import. Pro at $39.99/yr adds offline access, route optimization, booking deals, Google Maps export, and an AI assistant.
Two limits worth knowing before you subscribe. The AI assistant suggests places; it doesn't write the plan, so a 10-day trip is still a 2-to-5-hour build, one pin at a time. And some users report the app slowing down on very large trips. The full pricing breakdown covers what each tier actually includes; the feature-by-feature review covers the workflow.
TripIt: the booking organizer that watches your flight
Best if: your trips are heavy on bookings and light on sightseeing logistics, or you fly enough that a gate change at 6am matters.
TripIt does one thing with real depth. Forward any confirmation email — flight, hotel, rental car, restaurant — to plans@tripit.com and it parses the mess into a clean chronological timeline. The free tier includes that parsing, basic itinerary features, and 3 document uploads per trip.
TripIt Pro, $49/yr as of July 2026, is where frequent flyers get their money's worth: real-time alerts for gate changes, delays, and cancellations, a seat tracker that pings you when a better seat opens, fare monitoring, 25 documents per trip, and neighborhood safety scores.
What TripIt doesn't do is plan. No activity suggestions, no routes, no budgets, and sharing stays view-only unless both people have Pro. If your question is "what should we do on Tuesday?", TripIt has no opinion. That's the gap the TripIt alternatives roundup exists to fill, and the TripIt vs AI planner breakdown looks at in detail.
Pricing: $39.99 vs $49, for different jobs
The $9 gap between the two Pro tiers matters less than what each one gates. Wanderlog keeps the actual planning free and charges for convenience: offline maps, route optimization, the AI assistant. TripIt gives away the organizing and charges for vigilance: the alerts, trackers, and monitoring that only pay off if you travel often.
A rough rule from the tiers themselves: a couple of leisure trips a year rarely justify either subscription. Weekly flights justify TripIt Pro quickly. A three-week, twelve-stop road trip is where Wanderlog Pro's offline access and route optimization earn the $39.99.
The gap neither fills
Both tools assume you'll do the thinking. Wanderlog gives you a better workbench for it; TripIt skips it entirely and waits for the confirmations. Neither produces a complete, budget-aware day-by-day plan from your preferences.
Disclosure: this is our own product, described the same way as the tools above, including its limits.
MonkeyEatingMango starts where both stop. Answer 8 questions about destination, dates, budget, and travel style, and AI generates the full day-by-day plan in a few minutes: estimated costs in your local currency, an embedded map per day, and free PDF, Excel, and Google Sheets export. No account required.
Its limits are the mirror image of theirs: no drag-and-drop workspace like Wanderlog, no inbox parsing or flight alerts like TripIt. It writes the first draft; they help you rework and manage it. If you'd rather own the file outright, a free itinerary template in Google Sheets, Excel, or Word skips apps altogether.
Which should you pick?
- Choose Wanderlog if you enjoy planning, travel with a group on mixed devices, or you're routing a road trip. Its free tier does more than most tools' paid ones.
- Choose TripIt if you book a lot and plan a little, or fly often enough that flight alerts and seat tracking pay for themselves at $49/yr.
- Choose both if you want the whole arc covered: plan in Wanderlog, forward the bookings to TripIt when the trip is real. The free tiers are enough to test the pipeline.
- Choose a generator like MonkeyEatingMango if you'd rather start from a finished, budget-aware plan and edit down instead of building up.
For the wider field, see the 11 best Wanderlog alternatives and the three-way TripIt vs Wanderlog vs Google Trips comparison. To see what a generated plan looks like: 7-day Vienna itinerary or 5-day Paris itinerary.
Frequently asked questions
Is Wanderlog or TripIt better?
They do different jobs. Wanderlog is for planning a trip on a map before you book: pins, routes, driving times, group editing. TripIt is for organizing what you already booked: forward your confirmation emails and it builds a timeline, with flight alerts on Pro. Pick by which half of the trip you need help with.
Is TripIt free?
TripIt's free tier forwards booking confirmations into a trip timeline with basic itinerary features and 3 document uploads per trip. TripIt Pro costs $49/year, as of July 2026, and adds real-time flight alerts, seat tracking, fare monitoring, 25 documents per trip, and international travel tools. Verify current pricing on tripit.com.
How much is Wanderlog Pro?
Wanderlog Pro is $39.99/year, as of July 2026. The free tier already covers map planning, unlimited places, live collaboration, and manual budget tracking. Pro adds offline access, an AI assistant that suggests places, route optimization, booking deals, and Google Maps export. The Wanderlog pricing deep-dive has the tier-by-tier detail.
Can TripIt plan an itinerary for me?
No. TripIt organizes bookings you already made into a timeline. It doesn't suggest activities, plan routes, or build day-by-day plans. For planning, you'd pair it with a map planner like Wanderlog or an AI generator that writes the full itinerary from your preferences.
Does Wanderlog track my flights?
Wanderlog imports flight, hotel, and car bookings into your plan, but it doesn't monitor them. Real-time gate changes, delay alerts, seat tracking, and fare monitoring are TripIt Pro features ($49/yr as of July 2026). Wanderlog is built for the planning phase, not day-of-travel tracking.
Can I use Wanderlog and TripIt together?
Yes, and travelers who want both phases covered often do: plan the route and days in Wanderlog, then forward booking confirmations to TripIt so the flight alerts and timeline take over once the trip starts. The free tiers of both are enough to try the combination.
Which is better for road trips?
Wanderlog. It calculates driving times between stops and Pro adds route optimization, which is the core of road-trip planning. TripIt has no route planning at all. For US road trips, Roadtrippers is also worth a look.
Which is better for business travel?
TripIt Pro. Automatic itinerary parsing from email, real-time flight alerts, gate-change notifications, and seat tracking are built around the frequent flyer's week. Wanderlog's map planning adds little to a two-meeting city hop.
Is there a free AI alternative to both?
MonkeyEatingMango generates a complete day-by-day itinerary with costs, maps, and free PDF, Excel, and Google Sheets export from 8 questions, with no account required. It covers the planning half, not booking tracking.
Disclosure: MonkeyEatingMango is our own product. Wanderlog and TripIt are described from their public pages, verified July 2026; pricing and features change, so confirm current details on the live sites. Last updated July 2026.
Written by
Shobhit ShrivastavaPhotos from Wikimedia Commons, used under Creative Commons licenses