iPhone free travel app review

I was on a short trip recently and took it upon myself to compare 4 free/lite iPhone travel apps (Travelocity, Flight, TripCase and WorldMate) to each other. Their full versions may offer more but all I did was test the basic free ones you can download from the App Store gratis.

These are my results:

1. The Travelocity app

While this app puports to have a lot of options I found it to be quite cumbersome. The timing selections were not precise and the results took far too long for the level of information you receive. This was my least favourite of the 4 travel apps.

2. Flight by NibiruTech

This is the lightest of the apps in terms of the information (weather, plane type, alleged delay) it provides. During pre-flight it seemed to be accurate. It showed that my flight was coming in from another city and was, indeed, running late (on United = shocker). However, that seemed to be where the accuracy stopped as once my flight arrived for me to board it stopped providing information about the rest of the journey - even 15 minutes AFTER I landed at my destination. My flight, according to this app, just never made it there. Call Jack, Sawyer, Kate and Hurley.

3. WorldMate by MobiMate

The sleekest looking app of those reviewed here, WorldMate offers many features but does fall short a bit on accuracy. The face page of the app gives you the current weather in your selected city and the app provides other convenient built-in features such as a currency converter and tip calc. The coolest part of this app is that you merely forward your confirmation email from your airline to the WorldMate email address and the app will populate all of the itinerary for you. Once all of that info is logged into your itinerary tab it will update if there are any delays and/or changes. However, a helpful feature that would have been handy upon arrival - baggage claim area - never populated for me. Another bonus which I thankfully didn't need to use is the ability to look up Alternate Flights (and sort by departure time, duration, airline, or arrival time)...for that rare occasion that there's a flight 'modification' Overall, a pretty solid app.

4. TripCase by Sabre

This app slightly edges out WorldMate mostly due to accuracy. Unlike WorldMate, you have to input the flight information yourself but you can rest assured on the accuracy as Sabre is an industry leader in travel information. Hotel and hire car information can also be entered. Allegedly, TripCase can import some details via a record locator or Trip ID number. I didn't have the opportunity to utilise this information. When you have all of the information loaded in and updated you will see a wealth of information (as in WorldMate) but this time replete with Baggage Claim area, departure gate information and various contact numbers for the airline in case you should ever need them. Under your trip tab there are several grey sub-tabs which provide information such as weather, airport map and alternate flights.

Overall, TripCase narrowly leads WorldMate and mostly based on accuracy of a couple of items (Baggage info and Boarding gate). I will continue to use these 2 apps on longer trips and let you know how they fare and if they have any fierce competition coming out of the AppStore.

Bon Voyage.