By the time you finish planning a vacation, you’ll need an even longer one to alleviate all the stress that went into coordinating with friends, buying tickets, and creating an itinerary. But there may be a way to make the pre-vacation part of a vacation a little less stressful — it’s all thanks to PlanChat, an all-in-one messaging app that allows users to discover, plan, and coordinate trips or outings as a group. And now, you can download it for free in the Apple App store.
This group messaging platform is dedicated to making the planning process a bit less stressful, complicated, and/or painful. By integrating with both text messaging and email, PlanChat promises that “no one is left out in the planning process, even if they don’t have the app.”
Users can discover trips through PlanChat by checking out personalized travel suggestions, then add a desired trip idea to a watch list so that PlanChat can monitor ticket prices and notify users as to the perfect time to book. And when you’re ready to share your ideas with your friends and family, the app lets you send personalized invitations to your companions and use message threads to stay connected throughout the entire process.
And of course, it’s not just getting there that takes some coordination — you can also plan what you’ll do once you’ve arrived at your destination with PlanChat’s social itinerary feature. Create polls or see who’s available when through RSVP integrations for easy coordination. You can even split expenses for everything from hotels to activities to transportation with the app’s Venmo integration. And because this seamlessly planned trip will doubtless be the best one of your life, PlanChat lets you memorialize and share your trip and planning history so you (or anyone else) can replicate your experience.
“Planning any type of experience right now, whether it’s a night out or week-long vacation, is a hassle with hundreds of scattered moving parts, and that becomes even more difficult for groups,” said Sina Shekou, founder of PlanChat. “We’ve created a social, real-time messaging platform that combines every component of the planning process into one easy-to-use app, so everyone in the group can have a say. PlanChat now makes it easier than ever to turn trip research and planning into a memorable group experience.”