The best road trip planners, honestly compared
Last updated July 2026 · maintained by Stopful (yes, we make one of these — the table below still tells you where the others win)
Feature comparison
| Feature | Stopful (this site) | Roadtrippers | Wanderlog | Google My Maps | Furkot | TripIt |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free / $59.99·yr | Free / $39.99·yr | Free | Free / $14·yr | Free / ~$49·yr |
| Works with no account | Yesplan, save & share | No | Noaccount required | NoGoogle account | Partialplan yes, save no | No |
| Stops per trip (free) | Up to 60 | 7 | Unlimited | ~10 (route) | Generous | n/a |
| Map-first planning | Yes | Yes | Partiallist-first | Yes | Yes | No |
| Drive time & distance per leg | Yes | Yes | Yes | Partialwhole route only | Yes | No |
| Auto day-splitting | Yesby max km/day | Partial | Yes | No | Yes | No |
| Hotel booking w/ dates & guests prefilled | Yes | Partial | Partialsearch links | No | Partial | No |
| Warns when an overnight stop has no bed booked | Yes | No | No | No | No | No |
| EV chargers along the route | Yes | Partial | No | Partialsearch only | Partialfuel stops | No |
| Budget / expense tracking | Yes+ fuel estimate | No | Yes | No | Yespaid | No |
| Forward a booking email → itinerary | Yes | No | Yes | No | No | Yesits core feature |
| Real-time collaboration | Partialshare-link, async | Partial | Yeslive, Docs-style | Yeslive | Partial | No |
| Share via link (recipient needs no account) | Yes | No | Partialto view | PartialGoogle sign-in to edit | Partial | No |
| Native mobile app / offline | Noweb app, responsive | Yes | Yes | Yes | Partial | Yes |
| Curated attractions / POI database | PartialAI suggestions | Yeslarge, + campgrounds | Yeslarge, + reviews | YesGoogle Places | Yes | No |
| Built-in AI trip planning | YesClaude | PartialAutopilot | Yespaid | No | No | No |
| Agent / API access (MCP server) | Yesunique | No | No | No | No | No |
● Yes ● Partial / paid / limited ● No. Free-tier behaviour where a paid tier exists. Verified July 2026; pricing and features change — check each provider's site.
Which road trip planner should you choose?
There's no single winner — the right pick depends on what your trip needs:
- You want it free, on a map, and shareable without sign-ups → Stopful.
- You're planning a group trip and everyone wants to edit → Wanderlog, for live collaboration.
- The trip is about discovering quirky stops and campgrounds → Roadtrippers (mind the 7-stop free cap).
- It's a long or RV trip with heavy logistics → Furkot.
- You just want a shared set of pins → Google My Maps.
- You only need to organize confirmations → TripIt.
- You want an AI or coding agent to build the trip → Stopful, the only one here with an MCP server for agents.
The planners in depth
Stopful
Best for: a free, map-first plan you can share with anyone
The map is the app: drop stops and it computes drive time and distance per leg, splits the route into days by a max-drive-per-day, finds EV chargers and hotels along the way, warns you when an overnight has no room booked, and tracks a budget with a fuel estimate. Its real differentiators are that no one needs an account — a trip lives in the share link, so collaborators just open it — and that it ships an MCP server, so an AI agent (Claude and others) can build or edit a trip programmatically.
Watch-outs: It's a responsive web app, not a native offline app; attractions are AI suggestions rather than a curated database; and collaboration is link-based and asynchronous (no live cursors or voting yet).
Roadtrippers
Best for: discovering roadside attractions & campgrounds on a route
The strongest point-of-interest engine of the group — a huge curated database of attractions, diners and (via Campendium) campgrounds, plus mature native apps with offline maps. If the discovery of quirky stops is the point of your trip, it's excellent.
Watch-outs: The free plan caps a trip at 7 waypoints, and lifting that to 150 needs a paid membership ($59.99/year). No no-account sharing.
Wanderlog
Best for: group trips and detailed day-by-day itineraries
The benchmark for collaboration: Google-Docs-style live co-editing, comments, voting and free expense splitting, plus a genuinely capable free tier (unlimited stops, booking import) and polished mobile apps. For a group planning a multi-city trip together, it's hard to beat.
Watch-outs: It's itinerary/list-first rather than map-first, route optimization and offline access are Pro ($39.99/year), and — like the others here — it requires an account before anyone can join.
Google My Maps
Best for: a free, simple set of pins you already know how to use
Free, familiar, and fine for dropping and sharing pins. Directions and live traffic in regular Google Maps are best-in-class.
Watch-outs: It isn't a trip planner: no per-leg drive times as an itinerary, no day-splitting, no budget or lodging logic, and the regular Maps directions view caps at about 10 stops.
Furkot
Best for: long, logistics-heavy road trips (especially RV)
Deceptively powerful: automatic day scheduling, fuel-stop and RV-park planning, and fine route control. For a cross-continent or RV trip it does things nothing else here attempts.
Watch-outs: The interface feels dated, and the deeper features (bulk POIs, expense tracking, RV routing) live behind the Furkot Pass ($14/year).
TripIt
Best for: turning confirmation emails into a tidy itinerary
Not a route planner — an itinerary organizer. Forward (or auto-import) your flight, hotel and car confirmations and it assembles a clean day-by-day plan, with Pro adding flight alerts.
Watch-outs: There's no map-based route planning, drive times or road-trip logic at all — it's a companion to a planner, not a replacement.
Head-to-head comparisons
Try the map-first option
Free · no account · add stops and see drive times, stays, chargers and budget on one map. Or browse ready-made routes.
Frequently asked questions
What is the best free road trip planner?
Wanderlog and Stopful are the two strongest fully-featured free options. Choose Stopful if you want a map-first plan, EV chargers along the route, and to share or co-edit without anyone making an account; choose Wanderlog if live group collaboration and mature mobile apps matter most. Roadtrippers is powerful for discovering stops but limits free trips to 7 waypoints.
What is the best Roadtrippers alternative?
Stopful is the closest free alternative that removes Roadtrippers' 7-stop free cap and needs no account, while adding drive-time-per-leg, day-splitting, EV chargers and budget tracking. Wanderlog is the better alternative if your priority is collaborative, day-by-day itinerary planning.
Which road trip planner doesn't require an account or sign-up?
Stopful. You can plan a trip, save it, and share an editable link without creating an account, and the person you send the link to doesn't need one either. Roadtrippers, Wanderlog and Google My Maps all require sign-in before you can save or collaborate.
Which planner handles a big trip with many stops?
Wanderlog (unlimited stops) and Stopful (up to 60 stops per trip) both handle large multi-stop trips on their free tiers. Roadtrippers' free plan stops at 7 waypoints; Google Maps' directions view caps at about 10.
Can an AI assistant or agent plan my road trip?
Yes. Stopful has a built-in AI planner (powered by Claude) and, uniquely among these tools, ships an MCP server — so an external AI agent can build or modify a trip programmatically and hand back a live map link. Wanderlog offers an in-app AI assistant on its paid Pro plan.
Which road trip planners find EV charging stations along the route?
Stopful shows EV chargers along each leg of the drive as a first-class feature. The others are limited: Google Maps can search for chargers but doesn't plan them into a multi-stop route, and Roadtrippers and Furkot focus on fuel and points of interest rather than route-aware EV charging. For EV-specific range planning, a dedicated tool like A Better Route Planner is also worth pairing.
Which is best for planning a group trip together?
Wanderlog for live, simultaneous editing with comments and voting. Stopful is a strong lighter-weight option when you'd rather not make everyone sign up — you share one link and collaborators edit the same trip with no account.
This comparison reflects publicly available information as of July 2026 and our own testing, and is maintained by Stopful — we've tried to represent competitors fairly, including where they're the better choice. Features and pricing change; verify current details on each provider's website. Product names and trademarks belong to their respective owners.