A few weeks back on a visit to Washington D.C. I was looking for a content rich app to help me make the most of my first time in the city.

Stay.com

Via the IHG mobile app I found a link to Stay.com. The two seem to have some agreement or association although I’m unable to see what that is, but I’m glad they do.

With over 150 cities currently covered, Stay.com is the modern day travel guide on your mobile. Available for both iOS and Android Stay.com gives you a huge range of customisable city guides.

There are plenty of preset guides in each city, created by locals, travel experts and bloggers some of which provide great tips on those not so touristy places that could be easy to miss.  However, what sets Stay.com apart is the amount of content that is so easily searchable and the effortless way you can add it to your bespoke guide.

Once you have selected the city you will be travelling to, you can then choose from a range of categories to narrow down your search; Hotels, cafes, bars etc. Then scroll through and explore all the locations near to you or city wide. When you have found one of interest you can add it to your guide.

For me the stand out feature has to be what the app does with your selected venues once you have compiled your list. Firstly, you can download your guide to save on expensive international roaming costs. Secondly, the data for each venue includes websites, email, telephone and a near view map of the venue. Finally, the app takes your list and drops each one on as a pin into a map of the city. Each pin has a different icon to let you know what type of venue it is.

Final Thoughts

This is a great app, a great free app! The download option is brilliant and gives you all you need while roaming. The design and UI is so easy to use and delivers lots of information into the small space of your phone screen.

If I had to try and find a bad point in it, I could only point to the hotel section highlighting all IHG properties local to your location. Then it begins to list all other brands, which happen to be missing images, despite all other venues filled with media! Not to much of an issue for someone loyal to IHG hotels but not so useful for other hotel chains.

Travel guides to 150 city trip destinations:

Abu Dhabi, Aix-En-Provence, Alicante, Amsterdam, Athens, Atlanta, Atlantic City, Austin, Baltimore, Bangkok, Barcelona, Beijing, Benidorm, Bergen, Berlin, Birmingham, Bologna, Boston, Brisbane, Bruges, Brussels, Budapest, Buenos Aires, Cairo, Cancun, Cannes, Cape Town, Chicago, Cologne, Copenhagen, Dallas, Denver, Detroit, Dresden, Dubai, Dublin, Dubrovnik, Dusseldorf, Edinburgh, Florence, Fort Lauderdale, Frankfurt, Fuerteventura, Geneva, Glasgow, Gothenburg, Gran Canaria, Granada, Hamburg, Hanoi, Havana, Helsinki, Hong Kong, Honolulu, Houston, Indianapolis, Istanbul, Kansas City, Krakow, Kuala Lumpur, Kyoto, Lake Tahoe, Lanzarote, Las Vegas, Leipzig, Lisbon, Liverpool, London, Los Angeles, Luxembourg, Lyon, Madrid, Málaga, Mallorca, Malmo, Manchester, Marbella, Marrakech, Melbourne, Messina, Mexico City, Miami, Milan, Minneapolis, Monte Carlo, Montreal, Moscow, Mumbai, Munich, Napa Valley, Naples, Nashville, New Orleans, New York, Nice, Oakland, Orlando, Oslo, Palermo, Paris, Philadelphia, Phoenix, Pisa, Portland, Prague, Reykjavik, Riga, Rio de Janeiro, Rome, Sacramento, Salt Lake City, Salzburg, San Antonio, San Diego, San Francisco, San Jose, Santa Barbara, San Sebastian, Sardinia, Savannah, Seattle, Seoul, Seville, Shanghai, Siena, Singapore, Siracusa, Sochi, St. Louis, St. Petersburg, Stavanger, Stockholm, Stuttgart, Sydney, Tallinn, Tampa, Tenerife, Tokyo, Toronto, Turin, Valencia, Vancouver, Venice, Verona, Vienna, Warsaw, Washington, Zagreb and Zurich