Nine travel tech hacks you won’t believe you’ve lived without

With cheap flights and multinational corporations, travel in the modern world has become a necessary evil — but it doesn’t have to be a miserable experience.

DailyMail.com has compiled nine tech travel hacks to help you plan cheap trips, travel in comfort and make life easier when you arrive at your destination.

With the help of modern apps and technology, you can forget about tinny airplane headphones, the physical writing out of itineraries and the mental gymnastics of exchanging foreign currencies.

Connect your Airpods to inflight entertainment

Don’t settle for your airline’s cheap headphones — there’s now a way to wirelessly connect your AirPods to the inflight entertainment system.

Instagram user Nikias Molina showed a way to connect AirPods to the in-flight entertainment system on United planes.

Molina showed how to tap an on-screen Bluetooth icon and then reset the AirPods, which will then automatically connect.

He said: “You can now connect your AirPods to your plane’s display. Tap the Bluetooth icon.

Reset your AirPods. They magically appear when you tap your AirPods.

“You are now connected. Choose a movie. You can also adjust volume and customize noise cancellation.’

Get AI to plan your trip

ChatGPT is actually a surprisingly good travel guide that summarizes and presents all freely available information about a destination you might want to visit.

Ask ChatGPT for must-see attractions or list the best tourist attractions in an area — or ask what time of year is best to visit.

For example, if you ask ChatGPT to create an itinerary for a two-day trip to New York, it will do so.

However, ChatGPT’s knowledge of the world will end in 2021, so don’t rely on it for up-to-date restaurant recommendations.

Use a VPN to get cheap flights

Using VPN software can help you get cheaper flights by making it appear as if you are buying from another country.

VPN software (you can get it for either your phone or your PC) routes your requests through a server in different countries — and airlines often vary their prices based on where people are buying.

According to a study by VPN provider NordVPN, using a VPN can reduce prices by up to 47 percent.

It’s usually worth paying for VPNs as the free ones are often pretty iffy, but the savings are very real.

Translate menu instantly (and convert currencies)

You can translate text instantly just by pointing your phone camera – as long as you have an up-to-date iPhone

On iPhone XS, iPhone XR, and later, the camera can copy, share, look up, and translate text displayed in the camera frame.

The camera also provides quick actions to easily call phone numbers, visit websites, convert currencies and more based on the text displayed in the frame.

Open Camera and position iPhone so the text appears in the camera frame.

After the yellow frame appears around the recognized text, tap the menu icon and then select Translate to translate text.

Tap a quick action at the bottom of the screen to do things like convert currencies and more.

Identify landmarks (or flowers) instantly

Visual Look Up on iPhone lets you identify landmarks instantly (and you can also use this to identify plants and animals you might see on your travels.

Open a photo in full screen mode; an “information” icon indicates that Visual Look Up information is available for that photo.

Swipe up on the photo or tap the information icon.

Tap the icon as it appears in the photo or at the top of the photo information results to see Siri Knowledge and other information about the item.

Android users can access similar functionality through Lens (it’s available under Modes in the Camera app on Pixel phones and can also be downloaded from the Play Store).

Choose your seat on the plane

SeatGuru – now a subsidiary of TripAdvisor – is a great service to help you choose inflight seats and amenities.

The seats are rated from “Poor” upwards and provide information, e.g. B. where power is available on the plane.

The service offers seat maps for a large number of aircraft.

Get a flyover of a city before your visit

With Apple Maps, you can take a “virtual helicopter ride” over a city before you visit – thanks to the Flyover feature in Apple Maps.

It’s a great way to get a feel for a city before booking a trip.

To access it, use the button at the top right to select any card except Transit.

Tap a city name or landmark name. On the location map, tap Flyover.

If some landmarks don’t show flyover on the location map, tap the X icon, then tap Flyover.

On the map at the bottom of the screen, tap Start Tour or Start City Tour.

Keep track of your cases

Apple’s Airtags (or Tile if you’re an Android user) are a great way to keep track of luggage when traveling.

Apple’s $29 tracker falls under the Federal Aviation Administration’s allowable guidelines for the amount of lithium in checked baggage, making its use legal.

With Apple’s tracker, you can use the Find My feature to locate your luggage — or attach a tracker to your passport or keys.

Find out what you need to fly

Covid vaccine requirements are not as important as they were a year ago, but many countries still require vaccinations or visas to travel.

The Join Sherpa service provides a great overview of this for each destination.