The Edit — Travel
Are Travel Guidebooks Still Worth It? Guidebook vs Phone
A phone answers the question you already knew to ask. A guidebook is edited, which means somebody decided what was worth 3 pages and what was worth a line, and that judgement is the product.
This guide is research-led: we have not handled these units ourselves. If you buy through our links we may earn a commission — it never changes a pick.Research-led, nothing handled. We may earn from links; it never changes a pick. How we choose
Search gives you the answer to the question you typed. A guidebook is a set of decisions somebody else made about what deserved 3 pages, half a page, or a single line, and that ranking is the thing you are buying.
This page reads what each guidebook format is built for against owner reports on 4 books, ranked by rating and then by number of ratings on the method in how we choose. No trip was taken with them.
Lonely Planet's Where to Go When
Good fit You have leave booked and no destination
Not for You already know where you are going
Lonely Planet 100 Weekends in Europe
Good fit You take several short trips a year
Not for You travel for a fortnight at a time
Good fit A long trip across a large country
Not for You are going to one city for 4 days
Lonely Planet Iceland's Ring Road
Good fit The trip is a route rather than a base
Not for You are not driving
Editing is the product
A search result is ranked by what performs. A guide chapter is ranked by an editor who had a page budget and had to leave things out.
That constraint is the value. It produces a shape for a place — this district first, that one if you have time, this one only for one specific thing — which no amount of individually correct search results assembles on its own.
It is also why guidebooks are better at planning than at execution. The judgement holds for years and the opening hours are out of date within 6 months.
Lonely Planet's Where to Go When
4.6 across 629 ratings on a month-by-month planner, which answers the question a search engine cannot: not where, but when.
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| Format | Month-by-month planner |
|---|---|
| Use | Deciding, not navigating |
| Owners praise | Condenses a lot into one volume |
The highest-rated book here at 4.6 across 629 ratings, and it answers a question search is bad at: not where to go, but when.
Owners describe it as dividing destinations by month and condensing a lot into one volume, and several treat it as a coffee-table book. That is honest — it is a deciding tool rather than a travelling one.
Buy it if
- You have leave booked and no destination
- Season matters more than the place
Don't buy it if
- You already know where you are going
Print lead times make some information dead on arrival
A guidebook is researched, written, edited, printed and shipped. That pipeline takes many months, so any fact that changes weekly is stale before the book reaches a shelf.
Opening hours, prices, phone numbers and which restaurants still exist are all in that category. Treating them as current is how a guidebook most often disappoints someone.
Everything with a longer half-life survives it: geography, history, walking routes, how neighbourhoods relate to each other, which day the market runs, when the season turns.
Check the edition year before buying. A guide 4 editions old is a history book with a map in it.
Lonely Planet Australia
The full country guide, which is the format that earns its weight on a long trip and wastes it on a short one.
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| Format | Full country guide |
|---|---|
| Suits | Multi-week trips |
| Watch | Check the edition year |
The full country guide is the format that justifies its weight on a multi-week trip and wastes it on a long weekend.
Check the edition year on any country guide, because these are revised on a cycle and the cover rarely makes the year prominent.
Buy it if
- A long trip across a large country
- You want depth rather than a shortlist
Don't buy it if
- You are going to one city for 4 days
Offline is not a small advantage
A book works with no signal, no battery and no roaming plan. That sounds trivial until you are in a valley, on a train, or landing somewhere your phone plan does not cover.
Battery is the version of this that catches people out. A phone doing navigation, translation and photography runs down by mid-afternoon, and it is also your boarding pass and your hotel key.
A book takes none of that, and 1 of the 4 here ships with a pull-out road map precisely because 2 people can read paper at once.
Lonely Planet Iceland's Ring Road
A route guide rather than a country one, and one owner notes the pull-out road map — which is the thing a phone genuinely cannot replace at speed.
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| Format | Road trip route guide |
|---|---|
| Extra | Pull-out road map |
| Watch | Information quality reports mixed |
A route guide rather than a country one, and one owner singles out the pull-out road map, which is the format’s real argument.
Two people can read a paper map at once, at a junction, without either of them holding the phone that is also the navigation. Information quality reports are mixed here, so treat it as the route spine rather than the full reference.
Buy it if
- The trip is a route rather than a base
- You want a map two people can read at once
Don't buy it if
- You are not driving
Match the format to the trip
Country and regional guides are deep and heavy, and they suit multi-week travel where you will move between places.
City guides are lighter and denser and suit 3 to 5 days in one place.
Itinerary and route books do the sequencing, which is the part most people find hardest.
Planning and inspiration books are for choosing rather than travelling, and they stay at home.
Buying the wrong format is more common than buying the wrong publisher. A country guide for a 4-day city break is hundreds of pages of which you use a single chapter.
Lonely Planet 100 Weekends in Europe
Itineraries built to the length of trip most people actually take, which is a few days rather than 3 weeks.
Current price shown on Amazon. We may earn a commission.
| Format | Detailed itineraries |
|---|---|
| Trip length | Weekends |
| Scope | Europe |
Itineraries built for the trip length most people actually take. A weekend is 2 or 3 days and the hard part is sequencing, not finding candidates.
For anyone taking several short trips a year rather than one long one, this format does more work than a country guide will.
Buy it if
- You take several short trips a year
- You want the sequencing done for you
Don't buy it if
- You travel for a fortnight at a time
Guidebook vs phone: how to use both
Read the book before the trip and let it decide the shape: which places, in what order, for how long. Mark the pages worth carrying.
Then use the phone on the ground for anything perishable — hours, tickets, whether the place is open today — and keep the book for when the signal or the battery goes. What carries all of it is a separate question, in the carry-on shortlist and what 22 x 14 x 9 covers.
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